No one is brought up believing he or she will spend her afternoons floating around in glycerin and glitter with her elbow. But here we are now- a little, far-flung web of repair men repairing one shattered winter scene at a time.
Snow globe repair shopdo not promote via billboards. You discover them like you do a good mechanic; by desperation or by word of mouth or by an intensely specific Google search at 11pm.
These places exist. And the folks in the workbenches have witnessed it all.
A snow globe appears to be very low-maintenance. Glass sphere. Water. Some fake snow. A small ceramic lighthouse or a small skating rink. Appears simple until the seal breaks, the water turns green, or the entire piece slides off a shelf and impacts hardwood floor. It is then you see the illusion shatter, the 1958 collectible of your grandmother.
The liquid inside isn’t tap water. Never was. It is usually distilled water mixed with glycerin that gives it a viscose and slows the fall of the snow. In some of the older globes light mineral oil was used instead. Adjust the glycerin proportion a little too much and the snowflakes will either fall too quickly to the bottom or will clump up or will not fall all. The entire visual impact is killed.
Most of the repair shops deal with resealing.
The procedure is so easy: take the base off the globe, empty the old stuff, wash the inside, fill it up, reseal. Practically it means fussy prying, no short cuts at all in drying time and the sort of patience which the likes of us really lack. The foe is air bubbles. One bubble of air caught in it spoils the whole picture, hanging there like a reproach every time one turns the globe upside down.
Next there are the music boxes.
A snow globe, whose winding clockwork has broken–that is a different beast altogether. Gears strip. Springs fatigue. European manufacturers have not manufactured replacement parts to older mechanisms since the 1980s. Repair technicians scour estate sales, purchase broken music boxes solely to buy the guts, or are progressively relying on 3D printing when nothing available in the real world fits.
Carol, who operates a repair shop in a converted sunroom in upstate New York, says that one time he spent three weeks tracking down a piece of gear to a 1971 Swiss globe. Three weeks. One gear. The customer wept when it came on.
In nearly every occupation of this trade that emotional current flows.
Individuals do not carry snow globes the way they would carry a damaged toaster. It almost always has a story that goes with it. The world of a honeymoon visit to Prague. The one that a father purchased his daughter the last Christmas he was well. The memento of a place which is no longer what it was when the world was created. These stories are being heard by repair technicians. Carol maintains a notebook where she writes down the ones that she remembers.