Travel + Jewelry Stories

The Story of Murano Glass, Italy

This spotlight is on the story behind our Murano Glass pieces, treasures from beautiful Italy brought to our site! After glassmakers were forced out of Venice due to destructive fires from their glass furnaces, they all moved to the island of Murano which has become known world-wide for its rich, color-infused glass! We visited the island to see their beautiful glass artwork but most of all to shop for gorgeous glass jewelry-making materials and pendants, and we were so excited with what we found! Sure enough, almost every shop lining the cobblestone walkways over the canals showed off shelves of colorful and sparkling Murano glass.

The coolest workshop seemed like it was overflowing with boxes of glass beads, and in the attached room a woman was making the glass beads that we were about to buy. She dipped long thin rods that held small colorful balls of glass on their ends into the furnace and sat patiently twisting the glass in the small fire below her hands. (See pictures below!!) We walked out with bags full of beads to make the jewelry you see today, and beautiful pendants that capture all the colors of the beautiful Murano buildings themselves to give you all a little taste of Italy! If you ever visit Venice, I highly recommend that you take the short trip to this island and rather than just going to the stores, find the workshops themselves and watch this astounding process!

Fun Fact: In Italy, the word “allora” is used as a filler word such as "so, um, well, then..." So in every conversation with an Italian local, the response to my questions would start with “Allora…” which sounded just like “Ellora”! In the short time before I figured this out, I stood there wondering how the whole country knew our name :)