In Nový Bor, you can warm up not just at one, but two different spots! At Novotný Glass Studio, a workshop owned by world-renowned glass artist Petr Novotný, who has collaborated with artists such as Bořek Šípek, among others. All in one place, the studio combines a glass tool workshop, a sales gallery, a glass museum, and a restaurant, from which you can watch the glassmakers hard at work in the glassworks. A visit to Novotný Glass Studio is sure to be an unforgettable experience.
A short distance away, near the Glass Museum, you can visit David Wünsche’s Studio where you can learn about the fascinating techniques of glassblowing over a torch as well as embedding minerals or silver. You can also purchase original glass pieces in the gallery shop. Everyone is welcome here – feel free to blow a piece of glass yourself or have something engraved on simax glass products.
In Lindava, you can thaw out in the AJETO Glassworks, also closely associated with Bořek Šípek. Many notable glass pieces are created here as well, such as the Tour de France trophies. And when it comes to tours, you can tour the glassworks, explore the adjacent garden decorated with glass, or, starting in April, visit the renovated Glassworks Tavern where you can try your hand at blowing a delicate piece of glass and sample craft beer brewed especially for Ajeto by the BorN Brewery.
A glimpse of real history awaits you at the Haidl & Son Glassworks in Svojkov, a workshop specializing in the production of replicas of historical glass. Viking, Romanesque, Medieval, Renaissance, or forest glass – whatever comes to mind, you will find it here. Goblets, cups and jugs made here can even be spotted in movies. A typical example is green forest glass which is surely owned by anyone who has ever visited northern Bohemia. At these glassworks, you can step back in time a few hundred years in a pleasant atmosphere and forget the worries of everyday life.
A glass wonderland is to be experienced in Kunratice u Cvikova at Pačinek Glass. Jiří Pačinek, the local maestro, counts among the most prominent glass artists in the world, and it certainly shows in his work – a visit to his glassworks feels like an excursion into Alice’s Wonderland! The building is surrounded by the “Glass Garden,” a garden literally filled with wonderful glass pieces. You will find here hundreds of species of flowers and creatures you have never seen before… all of it made of glass. At the glassworks, you can watch the glassblowers at work. Children will enjoy themselves in the play area, while adults can visit the Crystal Cathedral – the church across the street – currently filled with artistic pieces that lend it an air of mystery.
