The Rough Guide to Venice and the Veneto

from the vaporetto stop is made by machine. Lace-making used to be a skill that
crossed all social boundaries: for noblewomen it was an expression of feminine
creativity; for nuns it was an exercise in humility and contemplation; and for the
poorest it was simply a source of income. Its production was once geographically
diverse, too – Dogaressa Morosina Morosini set up a large and successful workshop
near Santa Fosca (Cannaregio) in the late sixteenth century, for instance – but
nowadays Burano is the exclusive centre. (By the end of the sixteenth century,
lace-making had become the chief pastime of upper-class Venetian women, and
the printing presses were turning out a range of manuals on the subject, with titles
such as La gloria e l’honore de ponti tagliati et ponti in aere – “The Glory and Honour of
Bobbin and Needle Lace”.) Much sentimental nonsense has been written about the
craft: “every Burano cottage doorway has its demure lace-maker, stitching away in
the northern islands
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Burano and San Francesco del Deserto
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