Duckbill shears

What it is

Duckbill shears look like ordinary shears, but the tips are rounded and angled slightly away from each other so they don’t catch the glass while cutting.⁠^⁠[1] Cutting Edge’s version doesn’t close all the way, “so the blade stays in the cut”, and its round nose stops it snagging on the far side of the cut.⁠^⁠[2]

How it’s used

They’re trim shears⁠^⁠[2]

the rounded tips let them cut along the glass without the point catching at the end of the cut.⁠^⁠[1]⁠[2]

History

The Conciatore lexicon says duckbill shears weren’t used on Murano until about thirty years before it was written, when they arrived from the United States, which in turn had them from Sweden and the UK; the lexicon adds that they still weren’t fully adopted there.⁠^⁠[1] Its Muranese name, tagiante a beco de anara, means “duck-bill shears”.⁠^⁠[1] The Czech maker Mitiska calls its version kachny, “ducks”.⁠^⁠[4]

In 2014, after flameworkers at the Degenerate Flame Off asked for a smaller version of the standard duckbill, Cutting Edge Products introduced the Duckbill Mini.⁠^⁠[3]