Pro­nounce Venezia, Ve·né·zia (va-netzia):

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As we sail along to our final Bella Div­ina des­ti­na­tion, we arrive in the City of the Waters,  Venice. When arriv­ing in Venice, you may feel like you are back in time. Indeed, you are see­ing the “City of Bridges” just as it was cen­turies ago. With­out streets and cars to place you in a mod­ern era, you are left with the gen­tle waters, bob­bing gon­do­las and wind­ing walk­ways. Oh sure, a motor boat or vaporetto (water taxi) may throw you off every now and then, but for the most part, Venice has an time­less ele­gance that is unmatched.

Aside from the city itself, Venice is per­haps most well known for it’s Car­ni­val and arti­san glass. As with most cer­e­monies and fes­ti­vals, Car­ni­val started because of a reli­gious hol­i­day. In this case, in cel­e­bra­tion of the day before lint. A far more élite Fat Tues­day or Mardi Gras, if you will. It is said to have started in 1296 and con­tin­ued as an offi­cial cel­e­bra­tion (hav­ing turned into a cel­e­bra­tion  of the pride of Venice and it’s cul­ture), through the Renais­sance and into 1791, when the repub­lic fell due to the Aus­trian occu­pa­tion.

Until about 1979, Car­ni­val was cel­e­brated mainly by chil­dren, sim­i­lar to Hal­loween, with cos­tumes and par­ties. Funny, isn’t it, how an event and it’s cos­tumes are so syn­ony­mous with Venice, yet really, up until about 20  years ago, it was some­thing we only knew from books and movies.

Why did Car­ni­val resume, you ask? Well, as some­one once said, “It takes a vil­lage to raise a child” and appar­ently, the teenagers of Venice, who we nor­mally would imag­ine to be sophis­ti­cated and eru­dite, skilled in gas­tron­omy and fine man­ners, were becom­ing, how you say, rowdy. The cel­e­bra­tion was so suc­cess­ful, it con­tin­ued, and, hor­ror, tourists began to arrive, and arrive, and arrive. If there is one thing Vene­tians really just tol­er­ate, it’s tourists. And yet, it is essen­tial to the city’s finan­cial well-being.

Another fac­tor that brings tourists to Venice, is the afore­men­tioned Venet­ian Glass. The actual authen­tic glass blow­ing facil­i­ties are not on the island of Venice. In 1291, glass­blow­ers were moved and con­fined to Murano , due to the risk of fire. Murano glass chan­de­liers, mir­rors, beads, et al, became famous through­out Europe. Because of the finan­cial boon and rep­u­ta­tion this prized skill brought to the city, the glass­blow­ing process was a highly guarded secret. Both the trade and the secret were so valu­able that, although the glass­blow­ers rose to promi­nent social sta­tus and min­gled with the élite, they were offi­cially not allowed to leave Venice.

With Murano main­tain­ing a monop­oly on supe­rior glass for cen­turies and con­tin­u­ally invent­ing exquis­ite tech­nique and tech­nolo­gies, that are still used today, the Venet­ian glass­blow­ers were a highly sought after com­mod­ity through­out Europe. In fact, The Hall of Mir­rors at Ver­sailles was crafted by Venet­ian arti­sans. The glass­blow­ers them­selves were anx­ious to expand and take advan­tage of the demand. Some of the crafts­men took the risk, and qual­ity glass­blow­ing spread through­out Europe and beyond. And yet, Murano and Venice still have the most his­tor­i­cal and famous glass brand in the world.

But what has all this got to do with flow­ers? And the fra­grances of Bella Div­ina? Well, as you can tell, Venice is not exactly know for her gar­dens. So, how would I asso­ciate a flower with this mag­i­cal city?

Venice was first regarded by the Romans as a fish­ing lagoon. The 118 islands that make up Venice, evolved into a major port city and became a leader in the com­merce of exotic spices, silks and grain. This is where Marco Polo sails into the pic­ture (sorry, couldn’t resist). Before he became a well-know sum­mer­time pool game, Marco Polo was a Venet­ian mer­chant. His claim to fame, how­ever, is his 24 year sail­ing expe­di­tion to Asia. He embarked on these trav­els with his father and uncle, when Marco was just 17. You can imag­ine all the trea­sures he returned with. One such trea­sure was the Wong-shi flower. A rare flower sim­i­lar to a gar­de­nia. It was val­ued in the Ori­ent and Venice as a “love potion”. Yes, you may well fall for it’s deep, rich, not too-sweet, exotic flo­ral fra­grance. We have tried to recre­ate the essence of this flower in our Venezia fra­grance. Let us know if it cast it’s spell.

Allow me to leave you with my favorite mem­ory of Venice. My sis­ter and I were rac­ing for the boat to Murano, think­ing we were going to miss it. Try­ing to catch our breath and buy­ing a ticket, the agent smiled and said…“You are in Venice, leave time behind.” That was over 10 years ago. I think of it at least one a week.

Can’t decide which fab­u­lous Bella Div­ina prod­uct to try in our Venezia fra­grance? No wor­ries, pick up a sam­pler. It con­tains our foam­ing body wash, silky lotion, lush lip balm and aro­matic can­dle, all  pack­aged in a gift or travel ready pack..with our sig­na­ture dia­mond charm, of course!