A house we carry
Making a Barovier&Toso chandelier takes three days. The dry mix, the “partìa”, is prepared in the afternoon. The furnace runs all night. The next morning the master glassmaker shapes the material at 1200 degrees and above, working with his team, the “piazza”, a division of labour particular to Murano.
The company puts “since 1295” on its site. Archive sources cited by historians record the family from 1324 and describe Antonio Barovier as a glassmaker in 1343. The present name is much more recent: a 1936 merger with the F.lli Toso glassworks, under the wording adopted in 1942. The registered company is still Vetrerie Artistiche Riunite, at Fondamenta Vetrai 28 on Murano.
The crystal follows the Cristallo Veneziano formula attributed to Angelo Barovier, with no lead and no arsenic. The Taif chandelier, drawn in 1980 for the Saudi royal palace of that name, is made today in six to eighteen lights. The catalogue lists more than a hundred collections and over five thousand possible combinations of model, colour, technique and finish, which makes ordering closer to configuring than to choosing off a shelf.
Artopia carries Barovier&Toso in Geneva. For pieces like these, the useful step is a showroom visit with your room dimensions and ceiling height to hand.