Techniques

Hollow ware applications are obtained by starting with a good-sized gob of glass attached to the wall of the mould. While the gobs are incandescent, the glassworker blows inside the object, …

Applied festoon filament decoration dates back to the early days of the history of glass and was used on both pearls and containers.

This decoration is called 'fenicio' (Phoenician) in Murano, and was adopted between the end of the 17th and the beginning of the 18th century. It was used before this time in various …

A glass filament is applied to a blown ribbed object which has been significantly cooled.

The blob can be in relief or incorporated into the wall by marvering the object. The blobs can be of various dimensions and can form big, pointed knobs like in some types from the Middle …

The Roman craftsman immersed a blue-glassed or another coloured blown object in a crucible of opaque-white glass so as to obtain a white inside layer ('flashing' or 'dip-overlay').

Glass rode have been produced since the beginning of glass making.

This is a very old technique which today though is also used for sculpture-sized works in the glass studio.

The rods which are cut into same-length segments are laid parallel to each other on a metal surface covered with refractory clay or on a ceramic slab, then inserted repeatedly in the furnace…

A blown half-filigree cylinder is blown inside by an identical blown cylinder, removed from the pipe and opened at the top, of a slightly larger diameter, exactly at half-filigree but with …

This is one of the most important techniques invented in Murano during the Renaissance. It was patented in 1527 for 10 years by Filippo and Bernardo Catani with Murano furnaces dedicated to Venice and was soon common practice amongst the Murano glassworks

Gold leaf on hot glass is already used in the Hellenistic and Roman eras and becomes quite common in Venice from the 15th century. Today it is used everywhere.

The gold or silver leaf can be cold-applied to the glass too in the decoration laboratory.The gold leaf is applied to the glass surface which has been spread with a flux.Then the decorator …

The decorative technique involves immersing the incandescent glass attached to a blow pipe, in a bucket of water. The thermal shock produces a thick network of surface cracks. The craftsman …

The effect is that of obtaining blown objects characterised by two or more areas of different colours or coloured differently. Two cylindrically-shaped blown objects which are different in …

In Venice, the blown object at the initial stage is immersed in a crucible of a different colour and then expanded, thereby thinning the wall of the glass. It was used for Roman and also …

Diamond point engraving on blown objects was adopted in 1549 in Murano, fifteen years after it was used on mirrors. In the Roman period, similar but rougher engravings were probably carried …

The engravings are carried out by a vertical copper wheel, which varies in thickness and size, welded onto a lathe, once powered by pedals and nowadays by an electric motor. A flexible brass…

A furnace-stretched glass rod is used by the lamp craftsman as semi-worked. He softens the rod with the heat from a horizontal flame fuelled by methane gas and air or methane gas and oxygen …

This is a second-stage working technique which was inspired in 1922 by the invention of borosilicate glass, Pyrex, in the United States.

This was one of the main techniques in the Venetian Renaissance and the façon de Venise glassworks. This technique has never been abandoned in Murano.

A small quantity of glass is attached to a short metal rod by the specialised craftsman, and then inserted in a star-shaped mould. After being briefly immersed in water to cool the glass, it…

Fused glass is poured from a crucible onto a metal surface and flattened in the shape of a round plate. In the case of gold or silver leaf mosaic, the metal leaf is laid on the plate, then a…

The name derives from a note by the famous English glass craftsman George Ravenscroft in 1677. But it was already in use during the Venetian Renaissance.

This is one of the oldest techniques to form hollow-ware glass before the invention of blowing and dates from about the middle of the 2nd millenium AD.

Enamel painting is one of the most widely used techniques over the centuries, though it requires specialised technical expertise. The first known examples were from the Roman period starting…

The adoption of a metal rod increased the productive range and rendered the glassworker's job easier. One end of the metal rod was inserted in the crucible containing the incandescent glass …

The mono-block dip-mould glass, generally made of metal, produces an imprint of a relief decoration on the surface of the glass while it is the glassworker's hand that determines the form …

The craftsman picks up a small amount of glass with a blow pipe, slightly blows it (if he wants to produce a blown glass object), then immerses it in a crucible of different colours. He can …

Tessera made of coloured glass or sections of polychromatic rods, millefiori for example, can be laid together on a surface covered with refractory clay or on a surface of suitable ceramic …