Pietro Bigaglia

Born in 1786, dead in 1876. A great glassware researcher and technician, he gave new life to venetian blown glass in the nineteenth century. He was the first man who made paperweights with the inclusion of coloured glass, millefiori, long stretches, cannette, etc. He improved the tecnique of coloured filigrana and was the first man who drew avventurina in long stretches to obtain a multicoloured texture.
Already in 1674 the Bigaglia family owned glassware shops in Venice.
They made mirrors, lamps and window panes decorated with filigree and aventurine glass.
You can still find paper presses with his signature that are dated between 1845 and 1847.
Bigaglia exhibited the first millefiori paperweights signed and dated at the Industrial Exhibition of Vienna in 1845.
His work was again exhibited at the Murano Glass Museum in 1864 at the first major exhibition in Venice and Murano glassmakers.