Avy
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avy@avyschreiber.com
Make It Last
The broken glass, that is. Six ways to preserve
a Jewish wedding’s fi nal step.
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84
January 26 • 2017
jn
m eshkachech Yerushalayim, tishkach yemini. “If I forget thee,
O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her cunning.”
Boom. Crush. Crackle. The final step of a Jewish wedding’s
chuppah ceremony is the moment the groom steps on the glass
to shouts of “Mazal tov!”
There are countless interpretations for the tradition of break-
ing a glass. Some see it as a reminder of the destruction of the
First Temple of Jerusalem. Others say it is meant to remind us
that marriage is as fragile as glass. It also has been interpreted
to demonstrate how life is so fragile that the couple should
enjoy every day as if it were their last together.
At some weddings, and cer-
tainly historically, people used
light bulbs or wine goblets
wrapped in cloth napkins. Today,
however, there are many artists
designing vibrant, trendy and
often hand-blown Jewish wedding
breaking glasses and imaginative
keepsakes in which to keep their
shards.
Chana Perelman, director of
Judaica.com, says the real joy
comes not necessarily during
the moment of the breaking, but
ABOVE: Shari Klein preserves the broken glass
when the couple decides to keep
from her Jewish wedding in the pictured bag, illus-
the
glass.
trated by her husband’s children.
“Assign
a reliable person to
BELOW: A weddin
wedding glass keepsake mezuzah by
take
care
of
getting the glass from
Beames Desig
Designs, available on Judaica.com.
under the chuppah. The last thing
you want is for it to get swept
aw
away by the hall,” she says.
W
What can you do with those shards? Here are six ideas:
B
Box it up. If you choose a breaking glass in a vibrant color,
sim
simply boxing the shards in a Lucite or glass box, purchased
fro
from a craft or jewelry store, can be a real attraction.
B
Bag it. Shari Klein created a keepsake to help engage her
to-
to-be stepchildren in the wedding ceremony. She purchased an
off
off-white muslin bag with a drawstring and fabric crayons. The
chi
children — two boys, ages 6 and 8 — were asked to draw what
the
they felt depicted the special day on which their dad would
ma
marry his new wife. “When we brought it to the chuppah, the
rab
rabbi was able to acknowledge it, and it made the boys feel
inc
included,” says Klein, who plans to frame the drawing with the
gla
glass and hang it in their house.
U
Use it for a mitzvah. Artist Faye Miller says that among her
mo
most popular keepsakes are mezuzahs and Kiddush cups. Artist
Sar
Sara Beames says tzedakah boxes are among her hottest buys.
A couple
c
can place the tzedakah box by their candlesticks and
giv
give tzedakah as a family every Friday evening, collecting from
the
their children as the family grows.
M
Make a wedding memory. Broken glass wedding albums,
ph
photo frames and ketubah frames made with the glass shards
are also popular.
D
Design a piece of jewelry. The bride can take a piece of glass
an
and commission a keepsake piece of jewelry. Etsy.com artist
Sari Glassman creates a lamp-work necklace from the broken
glass of a Jewish wedding by melting the pieces from the broken
glass in the flame and adding them to 22-kt. gold leaf.