Crumble de verre orange mirror

Murano is an island which is part of the city of Venice and is located north-east of it. The importance of Murano is due to the presence of the furnaces for working glass which were moved there in 1295 with an ordinance which established their transfer for safety reasons. The concentration of furnaces and glass masters has led to a progressive development of the art of glass, making it one of the most recognized forms of craftsmanship in the world.

Glass is often considered as an infinitely recyclable material, however, only glass deriving from glass packaging (jars and bottles) can be recycled, the rest ends up in landfills and is managed as special waste. It is estimated that around 5 million tons of glass waste are generated in Europe by the construction sector, Murano alone produces around a thousand tons of which most is not recovered.

Crumble de Verre, is inspired by a glass processing technique prior to the invention of blown glass, already used in the Phoenician and Egyptian eras. This technique consists in placing glass powder inside moulds with a subsequent firing, creating a solid object through the fusion of the powder, this technique is called paté de verre.

Through the collaboration with Barbini Specchi Veneziani, the project aims to reuse glass waste from Murano for the creation of a new mirror collection through experimental approaches inspired by the paté de verre technique. Specifically, instead of pulverizing the waste, the intention is to reuse it in the form of grit and melt it at lower temperatures in order to create objects that are characterized by an aspect that can refer to the origin of the raw material.