Mdina Glass has stood the test of time - founder

Just about every tourist to Malta will have appreciated Eric Dobson`s lasting legacy to Malta: multi-coloured blown glass.

Mr Dobson and his partner Michael Harris first came to Malta in 1967 and set up Mdina Glass in an old hangar on the old British airfield at Ta` Qali.

Both of them had studied glass design and technology at Stourbridge College of Art, but they turned to Malta for inspiration in the designs, choosing swirling blues and greens for the sea and sky, and golds and browns for the stone and land.

"It is marvellous to see that our original designs are now so well established, even though the range has been extended so much. We created something which was not indigenous, and even though it may have seemed arrogant to assume that we could do it, the product has stood the test of time," he said to The Times.

Mr Dobson and his wife Margaret were recently in Malta for a holiday, staying at the Victoria Hotel in Sliema, after an absence of almost 10 years.

Mr Dobson used to come back to Malta regularly after he sold the factory to Joseph Said in 1985, but after this long absence, he was looking forward to renewing old friendships.

"There are three glass factories now, Mdina Glass, Phoenician Glass and Mtarfa Glass, and all of them have some of my trainees still working there. In fact, some of them were with the very first batch of trainees. Joseph Said, who took over the factory, had joined Mdina Glass just two months after it opened, and Mtarfa Glass is run by his brother.

Time has not stood still at Ta` Qali either, he said, noting that Mdina Glass might actually have to move out as part of the plan for the crafts village.

"We were the first - and only - ones there; in fact I remember that it was a real struggle to get electricity and water to the hangar! Of course, soon after that, the crafts village took off, although not much has changed except for a few more trees," he laughed.

Standing outside the hotel souvenir shop, its shopwindow - like those of just about every souvenir shop in Malta - packed with some of the glassware now available in Malta, he seemed more than satisfied with what had been achieved since two men with a vision stood in the baking heat of Ta` Qali...