For some additional context about how I came to study millefiori work, I will mention a few significant instances where these beads had an impact on my research.
When I was 16 (1967) and had just begun to work with beads, I pierced my ear. This was considered rather outré at that time. My friends Sandi and Candi gave me a stud to wear in my lobe to keep it open and to form a larger hole than a simple ear wire would make. The stud had a piece of rounded Venetian millefiori cane on it.
I could see the front and the back of this piece of cane, and wondered why the pattern was on both sides. Sandi patiently explained to me that this was a bit of Venetain glass, made from a cane, with an internal structure that allowed the design to pass continuously through the length of the cane. I understood what she was getting at quickly, and marveled at the ingenuity and precision of the work. This was my first piece of Venetian glass.
A few years later (1970) when I moved to San Francisco, and discovered Yoné Beads in North Beach, I found that Yoné had a lot of these little cane pieces, and I bought specimens of all the patterns he had.
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