Verreum: Reviving Silvered Glass
Czech glass company Verreum produces contemporary silvered glass pieces by designers such as Sebastian Herkner, Karim Rashid and Arik Levy.
Prague-based glass company Verreum revives traditional Czech glass-making craftsmanship, and focuses on unique silvered glass production. Verreum produces small pieces of furniture and smaller decorative pieces such as vases, bowls, lamps and candlesticks. The company collaborates with both Czech and international designers and design studios, such as Rony Plesl, Jiri Pelcl, Olgoj Chorchoj, Arik Levy, Karim Rashid and Sebastian Herkner, who also became the art director of Verreum in 2014.
In 2012–13, Verreum co-organized Glass Is Tomorrow network and workshops. Glass Is Tomorrow talks with Pavel Weiser, founder of Verreum, about today’s glass market and craftsmanship.
Glass is Tomorrow: From where does your affinity for glass derive? Why is this medium different from others?
Pavel Weiser: Glass has been my passion for many years. However, it wasn’t love at first sight but more an admiration for the skilled handwork it requires that grew slowly. The process that transforms sand into beautiful objects will never get boring, as I’m always surprised to see how it can push new limits.
How would you describe the process of developing and blowing glass-based designs?
PW: If designers address glass with no prior experience, it can be a real challenge to give life to a product drawn on paper – with little consideration for the material’s constraints. But for our glassblowers, such an interaction allows them to improve and discover new ways of blowing glass.
What is the climate of glass today? What tools allow you to maintain your position?
PW: For us and our type of product, the market is looking for new shapes and ideas. We are getting to where we want to be.
What was your experience working with Glass is Tomorrow?
PW: Glass is Tomorrow was a good experience for us to meet new designers but perhaps mainly of the blowers to see how their contemporaries work in different countries; how they use and improve their skills. •
Glass Is Tomorrow is a European network, which aims at establishing more fluid exchange of knowledge and competencies between glass and design professionals in the north, south, east and west of Europe. Glass Is Tomorrow is initiated and organized by Brussels-based creative agency Pro Materia, which also publishes TLmagazine with Paris-based publishing house Bookstorming.
Main image
Luca Nichetto: Bonbon. Side tables for Verreum. Mouth-blown silvered glass.
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