the.com/snow globe
a tiny weather system you can shake into chaos and watch settle into peace
means A sealed transparent dome filled with liquid and floating white flakes that swirl around a miniature scene when shaken, sold as an ornament or souvenir.
from The thing is older than its tidy name. Glass dome paperweights filled with water and a snowy powder appeared in 19th-century France, reportedly drawing crowds at the 1889 Paris exposition; an Austrian named Erwin Perzy is often credited with refining and patenting the design around the turn of the 20th century while tinkering with a brighter surgical lamp. The plain English label 'snow globe' simply welds 'snow' — an old Germanic word, related to German 'Schnee' and Latin 'nix' — to 'globe,' from Latin 'globus,' a round mass or ball.
- first patent
- Patented in Vienna in 1900 by Erwin Perzy
- happy accident
- Invented while trying to brighten surgical lamps
- fake snow
- Early flakes were ground bone or porcelain
- banned aboard
- Larger globes exceed liquid limits at airport security
- slow swirl
- Glycerin in water makes flakes drift dreamily
rosebud citizen kane — the iconic snow globe in orson welles' 1941 film, containing a miniature cabin
waterford crystal snow globes — luxury hand-crafted snow globes made by waterford in ireland, selling for hundreds of dollars each