The last hand-made Christmas ornaments
This workshop turning out hand-made glass beads for Christmas tree ornaments is the last of its kind. The little family business has been producing the delicate decorations the same way for over a century.
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00:00 Christmas ornaments of glittering hand-blown glass beads are a specialist handicraft that's
00:07 been practiced in the Northern Czech Republic for over a hundred years now.
00:18 I'm Barbara Kulhava and I'd like to invite you to our production of Christmas ornaments.
00:24 Barbara Kulhava is a joint owner of Rautas Glass Bead Production. Deep in the Czech Republic's
00:30 Crystal Valley is the village of Ponyklá. From here, Rautas sends its ornaments around
00:36 the world.
00:38 Barbara runs the workshop together with her husband, Marek, a glassblower. This is how
00:43 the beads are made. Glass rods are heated and pressed into moulds. It took him half
00:49 a year to learn how to handle the glass in a way that it wouldn't break.
00:53 For this handicraft, you need the skills and the know-how. But all the equipment is very
01:00 simple. You don't need equipment that would cost millions.
01:07 The skills for making the glass beads have been passed from generation to generation
01:12 and the pride along with it.
01:16 At Rautas, the whole community pitches in, for instance to silver plate the beads. Various
01:22 chemicals are combined and react with the air. This creates the silvery gleam inside
01:27 the ornament and the luminosity of the beads. Perfect for decorating Christmas trees.
01:33 The trend of decorating Christmas trees began in the 19th century and exploded, let's say,
01:40 after the First World War. The beads were perfect for Christmas ornaments. They are
01:46 tiny, they are light and they are glittery.
01:51 Nowadays the glass bead ornaments grace Christmas trees on every continent. In the Czech Republic,
01:57 they are a tradition dating back centuries. Originally, they were made to decorate fine
02:02 clothing and costumes.
02:08 First the beads are dyed and, once dry, they are hand-painted, slowly, painstakingly, layer
02:14 by layer, as they've always been.
02:17 The painting is quite intricate because it's time-consuming, you must be very skilled because
02:24 you need to be perfect in the painting.
02:29 Once painted, the beads are carefully cut apart. Nearly half of them shatter during
02:33 production, which only increases their value. In 2020, UNESCO declared the Czech glass beads
02:40 a part of the Intangible World Cultural Heritage. It meant a profound change for routers.
02:47 Now Marek and Barbara have opened their doors to give tours to a good 30,000 international
02:53 visitors annually. The World Heritage status is both an honor and an obligation.
03:00 We felt a big responsibility for the community of the glass workers here, of our colleagues,
03:10 because you are totally visible for the whole world, for the whole public, and you need
03:17 to handle with it.
03:22 The patterns number over 20,000, with more being added all the time. Designers create
03:28 modern versions for routers. A single ornament costs from 5 to 50 euros. Schoolchildren in
03:35 Ponyklá are already decorating their first tree, in anticipation of Christmas.
03:41 Keeping the tradition of the glass beads alive hasn't always been easy for Barbara Kulháva,
03:46 but the people of the valley count on her.
03:50 You are the last one, you have no other choice than to survive.
03:54 So they can continue making their world-class Christmas ornaments.
04:01 (upbeat music)