What is it about the Murano glass thing with people?????

[turnedlight]

I would say that you use the same techniques as they do in Murano, but whereas they produce many beads of the same simple designs for a fairly big market, so that they will see other people wearing similar jewellery to theirs, you produce beads individually as a glass bead designer and artist, which means although you may reproduce some of your designs more than once, they are still in very small numbers. Also, that you use the same sorts of glass to produce them as the murano producers, but also some more expensive specialist glass from America etc. which they don't tend to use in murano glass.. HTH!

[afina]

Resana is where they make lamps and parts for lamps. On Murano they make the glass for glassblowing, lampworking and fusing. I was there on thursday in the warehouse and asked, if they had a warehouse on the mainland where I could collect the glass, and they said no, on the mainland in Resana they only have the parts for lamps.

[lemon kitten]

ok.....so what's Soda Lime Glass then?  I bought a wonderful book called 1000 Glass beads and almost all of them are made from either Boro (and I know what Boro is) and Soda Lime Glass?

Janey x

[afina]

Soda Lime Glass is a chemical name for our glasses - Moretti, Lauscha, Reichenbach etc. are all Soda Lime Glasses.

From the Wikipedia:
Soda-lime glass, also called soda-lime-silica glass, is the most prevalent type of glass, used for windowpanes, and glass containers (bottles and jars) for beverages, food, and some commodity items. Glass bakeware is often made of tempered soda-lime glass.[1]

Soda-lime glass is prepared by melting the raw materials, such as sodium carbonate (soda), limestone, dolomite, silicon dioxide (silica), aluminium oxide (alumina), and small quantities of fining agents (e.g., sodium sulfate, sodium chloride) in a glass furnace at temperatures locally up to 1675°C.[2] The temperature is only limited by the quality of the furnace superstructure material and by the glass composition. Green and brown bottles are obtained from raw materials containing iron oxide. Relatively inexpensive minerals such as trona, sand, and feldspar are used instead of pure chemicals. The mix of raw materials is termed batch.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soda_lime_glass

[Mary]

Useless fact - it's the soda (sodium) that makes the flame flare orange, like the old sodium street lights are orange.

[Steampunkglass]

Resana is where they make lamps and parts for lamps. On Murano they make the glass for glassblowing, lampworking and fusing. I was there on thursday in the warehouse and asked, if they had a warehouse on the mainland where I could collect the glass, and they said no, on the mainland in Resana they only have the parts for lamps.

Ahhhhhh!!! That make sense now!

[chocolateteapot]

So...the glass is from Murano then...or have i missed a bit..very interesting this thread...
tracy xxx

[Flyingcheesetoastie]

I think the reason Murano is mentioned so much at fairs is it's a name people recognise and is banded about so much from ebay to flog it, so I reckon people think if they mention the name they are instantly glass experts and so have a greater connection to you!

I usually respond telling them that I use glass made on Murano and that I trained briefly there (I took a course in 2005 and helped out in a studio there too) but that my designs are a unique combination of many influences that result in a one of a kind piece made here in Scotland, which co-incidentally celebrates 400 years of it's glass industry next year.  So ends the pitch!

As with most crafts, most of the work of selling is in actually educating people as to the ins and outs of our practices, but it should never be a justification of price.  At the end of the day an item is worth whatever someone will pay for it, but I believe that it's worth waiting for that someone to value the maker too.

[chocolateteapot]

Great..thanks...i know what your saying..
Tracy xxx