Visby
Visby is a medieval walled city on the Swedish island of Gotland.
It has beautiful winding streets lined with picture-perfect houses painted in typical Swedish colours, lilac-bordered ramparts and views out to the glittering waters of the Baltic Sea. It is one of my very favourite places on Earth.
I’ve visited twice, first twenty years ago, and again in 2016, for a magically perfect sun-drenched late-spring week. That second trip is when I came across Visby Glasblåseri. We found the workshop by chance as we walked, and were fascinated to see glassblowing in action alongside shelf after shelf of beautiful pieces. We came back to Oxford with three of them safely tucked inside our suitcases. The one I’d picked was a simple small bottle, with a perfectly imperfect organic shape and a gentle green tinge.
Some time later I posted this image on Instagram, of a – very literal – message in a bottle. Christer, the glassblower behind Visby Glasblåseri, liked it, got in touch, and, after a couple of false starts, the messages in a bottle came to life.
To me they are, always, a link to this place that is so close to my heart. But, after penning so many beautiful, meaningful messages for customers, they mean even more – connecting all our stories.
You can order your own message in a bottle from my shop.
