Twice a year, we offer a “seconds” sale. These are fine art glass creations that don’t live up to our gallery standards. There might be a slight imperfection, color variance, or maybe we just don’t favor
the piece as much as another.
Each piece has a story, and each of us at Vetro has one that stands out from the others. Here is my
tale of a summer “second”… I refer to it as a “Royal Sadness”, which involved an ancient and very complicated technique using two teams of glassblowers working in tandem. Each team creates an open vessel. In this case, a rich irridescent gold and a deep regal Hyacinth base with white accent wraps. The two component parts are fused together at about 2000 degrees. A hole is burned through the side of the two joined vessels, and another artisan penetrates the side of the vase with a gather of molten glass on the end of a steel pipe. Then a few more gathers of clear glass are applied and blown out to the vessel’s final shape.
Well here is the part of our story that made this particular loss so difficult. This vase took at
least two hours to create, four team members, a lot of glass and color, and by the way… it is almost as tall as my two year old child! Worse yet, we thought everything was perfect with the piece until we pulled it out of the annealer the next day . On the backside of the vase was a small blemish where the vase had leaned against the annealer wall. Despite all that work, time, and absolute focus, this remarkable vase did not make our final cut. But that doesn’t mean it shouldn’t have a good home. Look for it in our summer seconds sale!
Summer Seconds Sale
25% to 75% Off Gallery Prices
Starts Saturday, August 13
"Royal Sadness" - The Vase that did not make it!!!