Marfil Jewelry

from: Fisheye Venice

One day in 2007, we were walking on the Calle de Mezo, near the Campo S. Aponal on the San Polo side of the Rialto Bridge, when Cheryl (on the left in the inset photo) spotted a three-wire necklace in natural greenish glass through a shop window.

We went inside, where Cheryl asked the proprietor if the necklace was available in a single-wire version. No problem: The shop owner, a South American lady named Rita, clipped out one tier of the three-wire necklace, added a new clasp, and sold it to us for €13 (a fair price, since the three-wire necklace was €30).

Rita's shop, Marfil, consists of two adjoining storefronts at S. Aponal 1249/B. One side of the store is devoted to moderately-priced glass jewelry, while the other has more upscale jewelry and gifts. It's a pleasant shop with a friendly, vivacious owner who claims to spend 10 hours a day designing jewelry and meeting visitors from all over the world. If you're in the neighborhood and you're shopping for a memento of your Venice trip, take a few minutes to meet Rita and check out her jewelry selection.

Follow-up: Cheryl's Marfil necklace was stolen during a trip from the Netherlands to the United States in 1999. A few months later, we stopped at Marfil and bought a sale-priced two-wire necklace of greenish glass that had visible evidence of a snipped third wire near the clasp. It was almost certainly the remaining portion of the necklace that we'd seen (and bought a third of) during our first visit to Marfil.

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