VENICE CARNIVAL

CARNIVAL COMES BUT ONCE A YEAR, LET'S MAKE THE MOST OF IT WHILE IT'S HERE

We wanted to paraphrase a famous saying because we wanted to surprise the ever increasing number of readers of our News.
But if Carnival has to be, and jokes aside, let it be Carnival.
And what is the most fascinating Carnival in the world?
Don't answer: the one in Rio. We know very well, especially for our local cockerels, where your thought is going, and it's certainly not the allegorical floats!

Let's talk about the Carnival of Venice which is undoubtedly the oldest in the world. Its origins go back to none other than 1094 AD, the year in which Doge Falier mentions it for the first time.
The first official document that declares it a 'holiday' dates back to 1296, where the day preceding Ash Wednesday was declared a 'day of holidays and celebrations'.
Just think that in that period of the Middle Ages people liked to 'take it slow' with the celebrations which in fact began on December 26th and lasted precisely until what is still called 'Shrove Tuesday' today. Sometimes, as 3 months seemed to some not enough, the holidays started in the month of October. Practically half a year was dedicated to Carnival. And then they say that ours is a hedonistic age!
The Carnival of Venice, as many know, begins with the so-called 'Flight of the Colombina' where a mechanical dove is passed on a rope stretched between the bell tower of San Marco and Palazzo Ducale.
However, few know the origin of this tradition.

In an edition of the Venice Carnival in the mid-sixteenth century, among the various events and shows organized in the city, an extraordinary event took place which caused quite a stir: a young Turkish acrobat managed, with the sole aid of a balancing pole, to arrive to the top of the bell tower of San Marco, despite the din of the crowd below in a frenzy, walking on a very long rope that started from a boat anchored on the pier of the Piazzetta. On the way down, however, he reached the balcony of the Doge's Palace, paying his respects to the Doge.
After the success of this spectacular enterprise, immediately called Svolo del Turco, the event, which usually took place on Shrove Thursday, was requested and programmed as an official ceremony also for subsequent editions, with similar techniques and with forms that over the years underwent numerous variations.
For many years the show, keeping the same name, saw only professional tightrope walkers perform, until even young Venetians tried their hand at the enterprise, demonstrating their ability and courage with various recklessness and variations on the theme.

When these variations led to predict, for many years in a row, a man with wings and hung with rings on the rope, hoisted and made to descend at high speed along the rope, the new term Angel Flight was coined. The chosen one, at the end of the descent into the gallery of Palazzo Ducale, always received gifts or sums of money from the hands of the Doge. There were some editions that saw the acrobats use animals, boats and various other figures for their shows, as well as making the enterprise increasingly difficult with daring evolutions and even collective flights.
In 1759, the performance ended in tragedy: at one point, the acrobat crashed to the ground among the horrified crowd. Probably due to this serious accident, this version of the event was banned. From this moment on, the program continued by replacing the acrobat with a large wooden dove which on its way, always starting from the bell tower, released flowers and confetti onto the crowd. From the first of these editions, the name of Volo dell'Angelo (Angel Flight) therefore became Volo della Colombina (Dove Flight).

Today the Carnival of Venice, which has been strongly revitalized in recent decades, attracts tens of thousands of people to the Serenissima who fill the blocks and squares with so many colorful costumes, extraordinary masks, for which Venice is justly famous, even if the originals, hand-made by master craftsmen, have been largely replaced by the usual 'Made in China' ones, for obvious cost-related reasons. It is the moment in which Venice literally explodes and not only with colors but with people, and the Venetians experience this great celebration not always with great joy, but with the annoyance of seeing their magnificent city with its unique history and the extraordinary monuments that it fortunately left us, literally invaded by crowds of not always respectful visitors.
But anyhow: every event carries positive and negative sides and let's limit ourselves to admiring the rainbow of colors and sensations that the oldest Carnival in the world and, we repeat, the most fascinating one, given that it takes place in the most unique city in the world, brings us.
And together with the masks, makeup is another fundamental component of the Carnival. Because it is above all with a good make-up that we can become what we are not.
To be able to hide, to transform ourselves into a femme fatale or a great conqueror, or a pirate, a penguin or a fisherman.
Scratching our cheeks or stretching our eyelashes so much that we fan them every time we voluptuously blink our eyelids in front of a cavalier.

BORMAWACHS TOUCH-UP

Makeup is also synonymous with retouching.
And so here we are talking about one of the historical lines of BORMAWACHS.
And of this line today we want to talk about the kits that BORMAWACHS makes available to its professional clientele.
They are a series of containers, all rigorously made of wood (and who could think the opposite?) which allow you to always have the tools you need for any type of retouching at your disposal. To make our friend Wood return to its original beauty, or to make it even more beautiful, as expected from every retouch (or make-up, for the Ladies).

SMALL BEAUTY BOX B1

MEDIUM BEAUTY BOX B2

TOUCH UP CASE C1 - PROFESSIONAL

CASE C2 - SEMI PROFESSIONAL

CASE C3 - SEMI PROFESSIONAL

From BEAUTY BOXES to SUITCASES (FIRST AID, C1 C2 C3) up to the fantastic and very complete C3 SUITCASE, a real FIRST AID to give new life to tired and stressed wood.
Complete tools that allow all types of retouching, from the simplest to the most complex. Without distorting, rather enhancing the Wood.

SOFTWAX

Soft wax stick
Ready-to-use wax filler, it keeps the original colour. Completely based on natural waxes, it is an overcoatable product for the restoration of wooden surfaces. Endowed with remarkable plasticity, allows for quick and easy repairs. It does not leave grease on the hands and has stable colors over time.
Light assortment: 50 white, 65 ash, 05 pine, 40 steamed maple, 42 beech, 06 birch, 10 larch, 54 douglas , 02 natural oak, 51 light oak.
Dark assortment: 66 dark cherry, 16 cherry-pear, 30 cherry, 62 mahogany, 33 dark mahogany, 58 rosewood, 48 medium oak, 52 dark oak, 53 light walnut, 59 medium walnut, 63 dark walnut.

SHELLAC STICK

Shellac sticks
Shellac-based touch-up sticks. Special for touch-ups on glossy substrates. Of high surface resistance, and high melting temperature. They allow invisible touch-ups of considerable consistency, imperceptible to the touch. Colors are stable to light, perfectly overcoatable.
Available in 20 colors.

HOLZMARKER

Covering Varnish
Paint marker, acrylic retouching with movable tip, special for wood. Light stable colours.
Indoor, outdoor use. Perfectly overpaintable. Available glossy and matt.
Standard assortment: 05 pine, 42 beech, 10 larch, 16 cherry-pear, 30 cherry, 29 light cherry, 36 light mahogany, 62 mahogany, 58 rosewood, 51 light oak, 52 dark oak, 14 antique walnut, 17 teak, 53 light walnut, 59 medium walnut, 63 dark walnut, 50 white, 60 black, 11 gold, 15 silver.

HOLZSPRAY, UNIFORMING, SEMI-COVERING

Special semi-covering varnish for coloring and uniforming internal wooden supports. Its natural expansion capacity and the depth of the color allow the perfect recovery of supports with an uneven or insufficient tone.
Sample color service is available.

TOUCH UP DYE

For wood
Retouching bottle with special little brush for wood. Allows you to fix permanently all the imperfections of the wood leaving the grain visible. Available glossy and matt.
Standard assortment: 05 pine, 42 beech, 10 larch, 16 cherry-pear, 30 cherry, 54 douglas, 62 mahogany, 58 rosewood , 52 dark oak, 17 teak, 53 light walnut, 59 medium walnut, 63 dark walnut, 136 pine green, 137 dark green, 50 white, 60 black.
Sample color service is available.

When we talk about our products, sometimes we seem to be out of tune, mixing "sacred and profane" in each article. First, we play around and amuse you (at least that's our intent) with frivolous topics, and then we talk about our products.
In reality, the caesura is much less clear-cut than it appears to an inattentive reader.
We at BORMAWACHS are proud of what we build every day.
For us, for those of you who appreciate our products and above all for our mutual friend: Wood.
Furthermore, allow us this comment, which may be anachronistic: we are proud to bring to the world Italian technology.
We therefore would like to accompany the description of what we build daily with great passion with some "impressions" of Italy.

Because BORMAWACHS is a global company, present in dozens of countries around the world, but it feels strongly and inextricably linked to this country.
That's why to talk about the retouches we wanted to associate them with make-up and therefore with the historically highest expression of the make-up itself: the Carnival, and above all the oldest one in the world: the Carnival of Venice..
You can give information while entertaining and having fun.
This is what we try to do.
We hope we hit the mark!