Hand-painted Christmas angels from the Ore Mountains
Does anyone actually count them? The trademark of Grünhainichen Christmas angels is their eleven white dots. Their faces are hand-painted, too. They’re especially popular as a Christmas orchestra set.
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00:00 When painting these charming little figures, experience is key.
00:06 You need dexterity, the ability to paint and work with paints, plus a steady hand.
00:12 It took over six different workshops and six weeks to make these Christmas angels.
00:17 They're known as the Grünheinischen Angels and are recognizable by the 11 dots on their wings.
00:23 They've been made for more than 100 years in Grünheinischen, a town in the Ur Mountains, about 60 km southwest of Dresden.
00:34 But what makes them so special?
00:40 Their design is truly timeless.
00:44 And they have this innocent and carefree look that is clearly won over people's hearts.
00:52 Vendt and Kuhn have created some 2,500 figures to date.
00:56 The treasure trove of models and technical drawings is carefully guarded.
01:00 Demand has always been high.
01:02 While Disney was a fan and the Swedish royal family still collects them today, the company insists on making the angels by hand.
01:10 But why?
01:13 Since the company was founded, everything's been made by hand.
01:17 They couldn't be made any other way.
01:20 You can do a lot with machines, but you'll never get the same attention to detail or soul.
01:27 It can only be done by hand.
01:31 The Christmas angels are also connected to a story about strong women and emancipation, but more on that later.
01:40 Every angel starts with a piece of wood from regional trees.
01:44 The woodturners' workshop is at the heart of the process, where the delicate individual parts for the figures are made.
01:59 Each angel consists of 14 elements or more, depending on the design.
02:04 Working as a wooden toymaker is a profession in its own right, involving vocational training.
02:15 Here you can see how the little individual pieces fit together to make a complete figure.
02:20 That's what's so impressive and exciting about it.
02:23 At the end of the day, you see what you've accomplished.
02:29 The company was founded in 1915 by two women, Greta Vint and Margareta Kuhn.
02:35 At the time, they were the odd women out.
02:39 Later, Greta and her sister-in-law, Olly, determined the fate of the company for decades.
02:45 The angels appeared in 1923, achieving international renown in 1937 at the World's Fair in Paris and winning a gold medal.
02:54 The angels' design has barely changed in their 100 years, and they've always stayed true to their Ur-Mountain origins.
03:05 They were inventors who were trying to create something new.
03:09 It's said that when there were imitations, my great-aunt would say, "Okay, let's come up with something new."
03:18 So innovation came from those new ideas.
03:21 This approach is well established here.
03:24 This closeness to home is deeply rooted, and of course that's reflected to an extent in our work.
03:30 The family business also places great value on documenting the history of the company for posterity.
03:36 Greta Vint's way of cutting the wood so the pieces could be glued together in a way that created the illusion of movement was her own innovation.
03:43 Today, like back in the day, the angels are assembled, varnished, and then painted by hand.
03:54 This is actually the final stage, where I breathe life into the angel by painting the face onto it.
04:05 And so, another Grünheinischen angel has earned her wings.