Murano Glass

In 1291 the glass furnaces were ordered out of Venice and onto Murano, officially because of the fire risk in a city built largely of wood, and in practice because it kept the makers and their methods in one place. The island has worked glass ever since. The techniques are the interest: filigree canes twisted into the wall of a vessel, millefiori made by slicing patterned rods, aventurine flecked with copper, and the thin colourless cristallo that made the reputation to begin with. The glass museum in the Palazzo Giustinian sets out the sequence from Roman fragments through to the design work of the twentieth century.

History

Glassmaking in Venetian workshops goes back as far as the 8th century, but from 1291 a law confined most of it to the island of Murano, in part because glass factories often caught fire (Wikipedia, Venetian glass).

What's there

• The furnaces - working glasshouses, several of them open to watch.
• Filigree and millefiori - canes and sliced rods worked into the body of the glass.
• The Museo del Vetro - Roman fragments through to twentieth-century design.
• The trademark - the Vetro Artistico Murano mark on glass actually made here.

When to go

Any time; the furnaces run all year and none of it depends on weather. Many glasshouses stop through August, when Venice is at its hottest and standing at a furnace is impossible. Demonstrations are mostly in the morning. Half a day covers the island including the museum and the walk along the canal.

Before you go

A large share of the glass sold as Murano in Venice was made somewhere else entirely, and the trademark is the only reliable check. Free boat rides offered near San Marco end in a hard sell at a showroom, with a demonstration that lasts a couple of minutes. Genuine work is expensive, and reasonably so.

Nearby

Burano and its lace are a further boat ride out; Venice is ten minutes back.