Good morning everyone,

When I was young, maybe between ten and thirteen, I used to love to root around in my mum's jewellery box. One item of particular fascination to me was a string of millefiore beads. This was fascinating to me, at least in part, because it was broken, the string on which they were threaded had frayed. I and my cousin used to pester my mum to let us take it apart properly and use the beads in our own jewellery, and she used to say no (obviously she used to say no!) on the grounds that she was going to get it fixed at some point in the future and didn't want us mucking around with it.

When I inherited my mum's jewellery I continued in the beautiful family tradition of not getting the millefiore necklace fixed. Until this year! A friend got me a necklace making kit and I finally took it apart properly and put it back together again. Here it is:

So this Fem Fri is all about the women of millefiore and Murano glass.

Here's a history of the technique by Layl McDill, whose art practice uses millefiore extensively:

But I'm getting ahead of myself because the technique was used long before it got its name. In fact, it was originally called "mosaic glass."  It actually dates back as far as Egyptian times […]  In 2014, when I went to the Louvre in Paris, there was this chunk of glass with a cow in it!  It was an amazingly detailed millefiori glass and it's many hundreds of years old.  Egyptians were using the millefiori technique as far back as 1400 BCE.

https://laylmcdill.com/windows-into-wonderment/2017/4/3/the-history-of-millefiori

Look at the wee lobster she made:

Turns out Murano glass is a pretty male dominated world, here's an article on women who are breaking the mould there:

women glassmakers have had to seek alternative means of production. Many use the technique of lampworking, common since the 13th century, in which glass is melted and worked in the flame of a blowtorch. These glass artists tend to work alone in small studios. One such artist is Cristina Sfriso, who creates intricate, small-scale statues using lampworking.

https://www.apollo-magazine.com/women-murano-glass/

Finally, unrelated to today's theme, but have you heard Fiona Apple's cover of The Whole of the Moon? I can't stop listening to this. It's phenomenal. Many thanks to the friend and subscriber who sent it to me. Also if you watch to the end you get to see her do a silly little dance:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3dZ5KjFLxgA

I spoke about wings! you! just! flew!

Alex.