With an easy, engaging smile and enormous hands that give the clenching handshake grip of a lifelong artisan, it is obvious that Roberto Donà enjoys his role in the city with the greatest glass history in the world. Roberto is the fourth generation of workers in the Muranese glass industry, and a third generation glass toolmaker.

Donà sometimes feels more like the bartender to the glass artists of Venice. “I hear all the stories, the successes, and the disputes,” he says. “An important part of my job is being a diplomat.”

The tiny glass factory island of Murano (part of an archipelago, which comprises Venice) where Roberto Donà lives and works is a closely-knit community where news travels fast, and there are very few shops that make nothing but hand tools for glass working. . . . . .