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Home > About Us
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Venetian Bead Shop is a direct importer of Venetian Glass Beads and Murano Glass Beads. Working directly with the bead makers of Venice Murano, often designing our own beads, we feature over 6000 different colors and styles of traditional and modern Venetian glass beads.
The Venetian beads begin with Effetre™ glass canes which are produced only on the island of Murano. Each Murano bead is handmade one by one by bead makers using a few simple tools and a lot of experience and technique in lamp working. Sitting behind a torches for hours at a time with a mandrel in one hand and a cane of glass in the other, they create the most beautiful beads in the world.
We have been an integral part in promoting Venetian glass beads throughout the world as well as helping to breathe new life into traditional Venetian techniques. A few years ago, we introduced our line of Venetian Dichroics to the US through as a result of years of efforts with our beadmakers in Murano. We continue to bring new and innovative ideas to this age old industry. Most recently, we developed the Furnace Glass along with our partner furnace in Venice. It's a blend of old glass making techniques to work with new fashion ideas.
We remain a family owned business located in Santa Clara and Sunnyvale, CA, USA where we have been importing Venetian Glass and Murano Glass commercially since 1993. Our wholesale showroom has the largest collection of Venetian Beads on display anywhere. We do work by appointment only. |
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History
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Ours is a story of the love of Venetian glass, a fascination with the techniques of glass blowing and, of course, a love of Italy and its people & culture. It all started with a trip to Venice in 1984 when Brenda purchased a Moretti glass necklace with the famous Murano beads (picture below). Many compliments and requests by friends prompted another trip and more purchases and sparked an interest in the glass. We began studying the language and our love and appreciation of the people and the culture grew. Importing the wonderful glass of Murano was a natural extension of our new lives in Italy with friends and family.
Exhibitors for many years with the International Gem and Jewelry Shows, the San Francisco International Gift Show and at various shows in the San Francisco Bay Area, we opened our first online store in 1998 on Yahoo Stores! We were pioneers in ecommerce! And, the rest, as they say, is history.
We work directly with the Venetian bead makers and the glassblowers of Venice and Murano, selecting and designing the styles, colors, shapes and sizes to be produced for our stores. We work with all the major bead producers in Venice and additionally have a large group of cottage industry bead makers who produce beads for us which helps us maintain our large inventory and diverse bead collection.
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About Our Staff:
Brenda worked for many years in high tech in the satellite industry and was Director of Marketing for 2 start-up companies in Silicon Valley. She studied glass blowing at San Jose State University with Mary White as Professor. Brenda has studied bead making with various San Francisco area artists. Shown here, Brenda had a very honored opportunity to work with a maestro furnace owner in Murano.
Bob is a retired electrical engineer and part-time professor of Engineering. He solves all our material problems and has experience with "cold work" of glass, polishing, cutting and grinding. This knowledge of the materials, and experience in working with the glass is a great asset working with beadmakers and glassblowers.
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Jeff and his wife Tanya also left the hi-tech industry and have worked for VenetianBeadShop.com since 2000. They, too, fell in love with the glass, the people and the islands and work with our bead makers and glassblowers. We refer to their new daughter Marcella as our little "Italian" baby. Marcella will soon be counting beads as she loves going to the "beadshop" and has her favorite beads already. She spends lots of time with us in the beadshop much like little kids in Venice. She is adept at string beads but her color coordination needs some developing.
Vincenzo (Vince) was born in Brescia, Italy. He is an avid car restorer, the older the better. Currently he is restoring a 1940s dump truck. He takes care of our store room and inventory. Naturally his Italian is perfect and he is a great help with technical questions. Vince doesn't consider any day started until we have our morning cappuccino and is often found at noon in our kitchen making pasta for us all.
Jessica and Michelle are both college students. Jessica has been with us since 2002 and Michele since 2003. They both know the beads and our customers. Michelle speaks fluent Spanish and Jessica is year in France has made her fluent in French. We also have Karen and Bonnie who have been with us part-time for many years.
Tina joined us the end of 2006 and immediately became indispensable, we call her the Brenda clone (scarey thought). But she learned our 10,000+ codes and names immediately and will be managing the office, packing and shipping.
2006 was a big year for us with a move to a much larger facility. Our Wholesale Showroom will houses not only our beads, but our large inventory of Murano glass such as our Murano Chandeliers, Venetian Vases, Murano Glass Lighting. We import a line of finished Venetian Jewelry and Corporate Gifts which are on display.
In 2007 Edith joined us and she is our best customer interface at shows. She's the first there and the last out the door. She says she joined the circus! Fast Forward to 2009 and Venetian Bead Shop moves again. This time we double our space and still growing. Our customers are the best!
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| Scenes from the VenetianBeadShop.com and our staff. |
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Brenda's 1st Venetian Beads Necklace |
Tanya working in Murano |
VenetianBeadShop (one door over) new-new Wholesale Showroom | | |
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| We enjoy bringing you the beauty of Venice, the tradition of centuries and the passion of a people who work hard each day to produce glass. We work hard to bring you the very best quality Venetian Beads and Murano glass beads at the most reasonable prices possible. |
VenetianBeadShop.com 1010 Stewart Drive Sunnyvale, CA 94085 USA Tel: 1 800 439 3551 International 001.408.245.5900 Fax: 1 408 245 5904 International 001 408 245 5904
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| Call for appointment at our Wholesale Showroom.. Sorry no printed catalog. |
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