The holiday season just got a little merrier in Poniklá, a village nestled in the foothills of the Krkonoše Mountains. The traditional blown-glass and beaded Christmas decorations that it is famous for has just been added to UNESCO’s celebrated list of Intangible Cultural Heritage.
Poniklá, a village named after a kind of songbird that once densely populated the forested slopes, dates back to the 14th century. For hundreds of years, it was a centre of weaving. That began to change in the late 19th century, when a unique glass-making technology – the craft of blowing hollow beads through glass tubes – made its way to the village, thanks to love (so the story goes).
