Dogale Jewelry, Goldsmith in Venice
Sospiri Bridge area, behind the Basilica of San Marco,
canonica bridge, castello N° 4318 – Map where we are
Telephone 00390415287549 –
Mobile & WhatsApp / Telegram 0039 3299 143598
Precious handmade jewelry artisanal production
Since 1969 Dogale Jewelry is a family-run craft business The owner is Mr. Giorgio Berto Egildo together with his sons Alessandro and Ursula
Giorgio Berto works with the gold since 1950, takes its place with a passion to learn the art of gold in the laboratories of the city who created jewelry for important account of the best shops in Venice.
Thanks to ‘instinct a passion for drawing and fancy jewelry he learned early the art of settings engraving of jewelry, essential for the creation of entirely blackamoor and other beautiful jewels.
A bit of history: Typical Venetian jewellery… Moretti as jewellery… but if you have a taste for mystery, talismans too. The brooches in the shape of a Moor that you can see in our website are jewels of the local goldsmith tradition, in fact they are the result of the original synthesis, made in Venice, of various cultural gestures. The origins of the Moretti date back to ancient times, when Saracen pirates infested the Dalmatian coast. In the Hellenistic period, earrings made of gold and black and white enamel were produced in Rijeka, Istria, which also served as a powerful talisman. During the centuries of the great fear of the Turks, when the terrible law of the strongest was in force, the people of the littoral always wore moretti and donated them to the churches as a sign of thanks for having escaped danger. Hence the amulet came to Venice, not to exorcise attacks from the sea, but to represent the victory of the Serenissima over the Turkish pirate.
The very term TALISMANO comes from Turkey: talis and talismon can be translated as “miraculous image” in the Arab regions, the term talisman designating a magical image. The Turkish priests who dealt with these objects were also called talismans. It was also the Egyptians who laid the foundations of the practice of talismans, the first, together with the Chaldean, Indian and Jewish races, to represent the stars and constellations with symbols of animals and men in order to use them for magical purposes. In history we find the Moretti in Carpaccio’s depictions as a mild-mannered gondolier with turban and feathers, part of a beautiful lagoon scene, and also in a famous book by Hemingway. With the consolidation of the Serenissima’s dominion over the Adriatic, the earring disappeared to make way for representations of Moretti in different objects and with other meanings.
In our century the imagination of the Venetians has given rise to endless variations on the theme: bust and turban have become a scenic space where the best techniques learned from local goldsmiths are represented with fretwork, engravings, filigrees, and also with beautiful fire enamels. The craftsman uses the power of the heat of the kiln and an ancient technique to colour the jewellery in a wide variety of shades, the most beautiful of which are undoubtedly green, blue, red and even blue. In recent times, monochromatism has often triumphed with pearls, brilliants, emeralds or rubies for a very select clientele such as royal families and nobles of all origins, even Grace Kelly owned a Moretto. Morettos have also been appreciated by personalities of international stature such as Barbara Hutton, Ernest Hemingway, Arthur Rubenstein, Elton John, Liz Taylor, and continue to be the coveted object of elite collectors, even Iris Apfel and Diana Vreeland, undisputed icons of fashion, bought Moors. Moors lovers include Andre’ Leon Talley, Anna Wintour’s right-hand man who recently passed away, the only black fashion journalist and artistic director of Vogue. There are some very precious antique Moors destined for very few; very large Moors (12 cm. and more) to be seen in a showcase as well as worn and particularly appreciated by American tourists; very old Moors (1950s, 1960s and 1970s), and then there are those currently produced in our workshop, no less precious and interesting than the antique ones, representing their oriental spirit.
In our shop in Venice – a few steps to the Duomo behind the Basilica of to the Hotel Danieli – you will have a large choice of many models of Venetian blackamoors (earrings, broochs, pendants and rings), you will have the possibility to look at the goldsmith during his work, who will explain t you how the craftsmanship’s realisation of the blackamoors is carried out.
At the Dogale jewellery is possible to order a jewel with the gems and the colours you prefer, or transform rings and other objects you have and also repair your blackamoor. You can recive the new collection just sending us an e-mail at info@webjewels.it, we will be pleased to send you also some pictures
Trade data: established in Venice, sestiere of castello, 4318 Ruga S. Apollonia Canonica Bridge
e-mail info@webjewels.it
Partita Iva 00275430270
trademark VE106
Registration with the Chamber of Commerce No. 98170th rec No. 11808th
We are a physical store and shop with the production plant established in Venice we promote through the website in a virtual exhibition, we can personally guarantee our products!
Store hours (9.30/12.30 – 15.30/19.30) for any further information please call +0039 041 5287549 closing day Sunday, in summer the store also closes on Saturday afternoon.
Perché sceglierci?
Our successful products
The Moors
The name and shape derive from the term mori, which at the time indicated Muslims or, by extension, Saracen pirates. The origins of these jewels go back to the time when the Saracens raided the Dalmatian coast. The name of Othello, Venetian general in the front line against the Turks to safeguard the properties of the Serenissima, prevails over all of them. Othello has therefore become a “very famous Moor” source of inspiration for the creation of the Moorish jewels; if you visit Venice In Campo dei Carmini there is the house of the jealous “Othello”, lately the hypothesis has emerged that Moro is the surname and that the real name was not Othello but Cristoforo…The people of the coast wore the Moorish as an amulet or donated them to the churches as a votive offering. These jewels from Dalmatia also arrived in Venice, not to exorcise the attacks from the Adriatic Sea but as a representation of the Turkish pirates won by the Serenissima: in some representations by Vittore Carpaccio they are represented as mythical gondoliers with turban and feathers. With the absolute dominion of the Serenissima on the Adriatic Sea, in time the earring gave way to representations of the Moorish also in different models. The imagination of the Venetian Oresi has given rise to infinite variations on the theme: bust and turban have become a scenic space where the best techniques of local goldsmithing are depicted with engravings, openwork, filigrees, corals and turquoises; the heads or busts are in ebony but also in turtle (50/60s) and onyx. More recently, the monochrome triumphs with pearls, emeralds or rubies.
The Skulls…Vanitas and more..
There are various and multiform interpretations that can be given to these objects: dark fetishes, passion for the dark, the decadent or the paranormal, lucky charms, superstitious and propitiatory objects, taste for mystery, fashion or simple collecting. The skull has always been a very assiduous image in the art world, in 600 memento mori in Belgium and Holland it was a very fashionable pictorial trend. Skulls as symbolic elements, allusive to the theme of the transience of life, and as a religious philosophical theme of the ineluctability of death, the inconsistency of earthly goods, the ephemeral, and the futility of human pleasures; the skull is the cultural and aesthetic universality of a theme not necessarily funereal but evergreen, which does not go out of fashion like a Doors record. In Christian culture, for example, the skull is a symbol of eternity, repentance; skulls for the man or woman who cannot escape death but through them can exorcise it.
Here then are our collections, with simple or elaborate skulls, with enamels and diamonds, in gold or silver. Ancient symbols, absolutely up-to-date..
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Engravings!
Glyptic from the Greek glyptos, “engraved” is a very ancient art by which hard stones and gems or other suitable materials such as shells for cameos are engraved. This technique makes it possible to make seals, carvings or even small objects such as heads, skulls, flowers and more. In our laboratory we engrave stones such as carnelian, jasper, pencils, onyx to make seal rings with noble coat of arms or mythological images; if you have your own design to reproduce we can make your personal jewel.
