Interaction of intense ultrashort light pulses with glass reveals new properties and phenomena, which challenge common beliefs in optics. Demonstrations of 3D nanograting formation and related self-assembled form birefringence uncover new science and applications including flat optics elements ex-ploiting the Pancharatnam-Berry phase. The S-waveplate (Southampton-Super-Structured-waveplate) is one of the examples of such elements, which can be used for creating axially symmetric polarization state and optical vortexes. The applications of S-waveplates range from material processing to micros-copy and optical trapping. Two independent parameters describing self-assembled form birefringence in quartz glass, the slow axis orientation and the strength of retardance, are also explored for the opti-cal encoding of information in addition to three spatial coordinates. The data optically encoded into 5D is successfully retrieved by quantitative birefringence measurements. The storage allows unprecedented parameters including hundreds of terabytes per disc data capacity and thermal stability up to 1000°. The demonstrated recording of the first digital documents, including the eternal copy of King James Bible, which will survive the human race, is the vital step towards an eternal archive. These and more recent demonstrations of ultrafast laser calligraphy and anisotropic photosensitivity in glasses are reviewed.