May Madness again!

Yes, its that time of year already when I am surrounded by boxes and a never shortening ‘to-do’ list! This weekend will be the MCM Expo & Comic-con at London Excel, from 26th-28th May, where I have a small booth in the dealer's zone in the North Hall. A lot of people tell me they get lost, the secret is to look at the big section numbers on the wall of Excel itself, we are in section N4 which is the section where the cloakroom stairs are, towards the back of the hall. I’ve attached a map at the end, look for us at BF2.

 

Just because we don’t have a huge stall doesn’t mean I haven’t packed it with as much as possible! I’ve lots of new marbles, pens, pendants, aliens, earrings, plus some brand new designs seeing their first outing at the stall. Look out for a new display box with a weird blue glow coming from it, inside a new range of VERY glowy pendants and earrings, all containing some high grade glow-in-the-dark pigment which the makers assure me can glow up to 12-20 hours after being charged with light! That’s not all, I’ve also a range of glass that only shows its colours when lit by UV blacklights, so ideal for clubs and festivals too, plus lots of other new designs, as well some new big wooden boxes and a show special on ‘B’ movie cushions too.

 

For those of you not coming to Excel who like to come to the London stall I have further good news for you. As some of you may know I’ve been struggling with time issues, finding it hard to be at Covent Garden and have enough time to make glass. I’ve finally got some help with two helpers who are covering the long hours on the stall. I’m still trying out days but at present this means the stall is open on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Thursdays AND Saturdays! Please do pop along and say hi to Ellie and Pip who will have the same high quality glass pendants, pens and earrings, but without my ugly mug to scare you away! One of the advantages of the extra time this will give me is time to create new designs, and some of you may have already seen some of the new mega-sized pendants I’ve been creating for the stall as just one example of some of the new items I hope to introduce over the coming months.

 

As you can see there has been a lot happening here behind the scenes, and this is just the beginning. I’m planning to increase the selection and variety of glass available in my Etsy shop too, so please keep an eye on my shop and Facebook page over the coming months for sneak previews of new designs as well. The Etsy shop is now closed for a few days though so I can concentrate on getting organized for the weekend.

 

I hope I get to see lots of you at Excel this weekend, right now for me it’s back to melting glass and packing boxes!

 

All the best

Glenn

 

100 Pens

You may have been wondering why the lack of new shiny in my Etsy shop, or general lack of new posts on my Facebook page. (Or maybe not!) Well, I've been making pens, lots of pens, lots and lots and lots of them. Endlessly. For weeks. And you can't have any of them!

Sometime last year a visitor at my Greenwich stall asked if I might be able to make some pens for a yearly event, which I'd said 'maybe.' Well a few weeks ago I was commissioned to make 100 pens for 'an event.' I'm not at liberty to say who for or what the event is, but the one main thing is that they all have to be blue, maybe with a little yellow. (And no, this has nothing to do with Doctor who!)

It's come at an ideal time for me, a few months before I start gearing up for Expos in October and November, plus all the craziness that happens at the end of the year! However I have had to put all the other projects and sculptural stuff on hold, as well as not having much time to blog, or make extra things to list on Etsy. Even my Greenwich stall is starting to look a little empty.

A few pens, and still a lot more to make!

In a way it's been quite nice not to have to think too much about what to make next during my days in the workshop. Instead of, 'do I make a pendant, and what sort, or a marble?' it's 'what to make next? Another pen! And then another!' I must admit around numbers 48 to 54 I did start getting a bit fed up of making pens, however once I got into the sixties I got back on a roll again.

They are now nearly finished, and hopefully by the end of this week or start of next week I'll have them all finished and delivered (crossing my fingers and toes that the client likes them!) After that I'll get back to some normality and start making lots of new pendants and marbles for the Etsy shop and the upcoming Expos, hopefully including a few new exciting things too!

Green Man Mask continued

I've taken the annealed mask out of the kiln and started work on adding more leaves and details. So far I've learnt;

Getting quite far along, still needs a few more hours yet

1) I need to think more about my work flow.
     I didn't really expect this first attempt to go so well, and jumped around the sculpture a little too much. This has left some areas under more stress as some leaves pull on others, and when I start heating sometimes this stress has caused parts further away to snap. There was quite a lot of re-joining and tweaking as I went back over areas, even just as I finished one of the first leaves came away that'll need re attaching.
    This time I went a little slower, as I added each new leaf I took time to make sure it was well joined, then while it was still hot (and the new join a little flexible still) joined it anywhere else it was touching the main structure to ensure it has at least two firm hold points, then re-heated the first joins just to make sure. I think 'just to make sure' should be the motto for doing this sort of work!

2) Nice work for hot weather.
      I do really need to get more pendants and big marbles made for the next Expo (yes I know it's months away, but foolishly I did book both London and Birmingham which are only separated by a few weeks). It's not too bad until the afternoon when the sun swings around, and the kiln starts getting hotter. This makes a nice change, and as I only need one wheezy old oxycon and the extractor hood on it makes for quite a quite and chilled out working.

3) Tricky to light, ok once lit
      Talking of old oxycons, it can be a bit tricky to get the mini torch to light and stay lit to start with. It might be because it takes quite a while to get all the air out of the oxygen and propane lines, once it has though it seems (mostly) ok so long as I don't have to turn it back off and on again! This is where a stand would be really helpful, if it allowed it to stay lit when needing both hands free.

4) Tidy that workbench
      Actually, I can't really see that happening, I even get around not needing to tidy it when working 104 glass by putting a board over the top of the debris! A separate little work area, with really, really good light would be ideal though, maybe that's a little higher too.

5) More plaster, less filler
      This poor face cast is starting to look like a bit of a burns victim, or something sort of Evil living-dead-doll from an Asian Horror film! The modroc is charring when the surface gets knocked or flakes off, so a thicker plaster/quartz layer might be better. Maybe also use chicken wire for strengthening instead. I mostly used modroc originally because I happened to have a big unused bag, and it makes quite light casts.

Charred and battered cast

6) Stay calm! Make good support underwear and it can be fixed!
      Hard to do when you heat up one area and another goes 'crack,' but that really probably comes down to the initial problems with not making some of the first joins as well as I should have or putting others under too much stress. Having to go back and re attach them has probably made the whole sculpture stronger and better made though. Next time I'll have to think more carefully about the best way of putting down those first leaves that become the scaffold for the rest of the sculpture.

7) Make more leaves
     This uses a huge amount of leaves, which is ok as I wanted to define the shape just in leaves anyway, but I never seem to make enough. When I've looked at Green Man pictures and original church stone sculptures they make most of the face with very few leaves. Sometimes it's one per face area (i.e. one of each cheek, one for the nose) and then stretch them out to make the shape. I wanted these green faces to be more like you might see them, when in a glimpse out of the corner of your eye the overall shape of the branches and leaves in the trees suggest a face, but then when you look it's gone. Or is that just me?

All in all this has been an interesting project, although it's not finished the next questions are 'do I make another in coloured glass,' and 'do I leave clear or sandblast it to a frosted finish?' And if I did frost it, it then leaves another decision, to then leave it as it is or paint it which leaves a nice matt finish? Mind you, as I don't have an airbrush/sandblaster yet it's probably not really a relevant set of questions!

In other news I might only be at Greenwich this Sunday (or not at all, I'm not sure if I can make it yet) so I am hoping to get some more marbles listed into my Etsy shop this week. As usual I'll give a heads up on Facebook to let you know when I start getting them listed.

Etsy Reloaded

I am having a tidy up of my Etsy shop, ready for an onslaught of new listings later today! This is partly because of the new postal prices - I'm actually putting international prices DOWN - and also because I've run out of propane, so I can't melt anymore glass until a new tank is delivered!

For a while now I've been charging more than I wanted to on international deliveries, after having too many going missing in the post I've upgraded to 'signed for' service. From customers responses I noticed they seem to have got there a little quicker, however I was partly subsidizing this and it still made postage very expensive and off-putting. I also had the unexpected problem that many USA customers have PO boxes, and as PO boxes can't sign for parcels I couldn't use the Royal Mail's International signed-for services anyway! So, as soon as I can figure out how, I'm going to start offering it as an optional extra instead, or just pay for it myself if it's a larger order. Oh, and go back to crossing my fingers when I go to the post office.

It's just as confusing for UK deliveries too, lots of the old smaller weight options and sizes have been removed, so it looks like everything I am going to post will fit the 'small package' size - so long as I don't overdo it with the bubble wrap and make the envelopes more than 8cm thick! It does allow me to post up to 1kg though, so for most UK deliveries in my Etsy shop it will now cost a flat fee of £3 if you buy 1 thing or 20!

Still confused, or confusing? I'm just glad I don't work at the post office, the Ladies at my local branch are the ones I feel sorry for as they try to unravel all the new size regulations. It was so much clearer and easier when it was just a matter of weighing a box!

In 'other news' I've been playing around with my second 'little kiln' which goes up to much higher temperatures (shown here at a chilly 880degrees centigrade! I've had it up to 958 deg C for these casts.)

Cooling down from 950deg C, this was taken as it hit 880 deg C!

However it's still not going to plan, although I've had some unexpected success with some beads I slumped into flat cabochons, I litterally popped them in at the last minute before firing to take advantage of some spare space. I've just fired some more, a few will be cropping up in my Etsy shop too.

 

Sawdust January

Well, as expected, January hasn't gone quite to plan, but then I never really expected it to! The original plan was, tidy and sort out the work-spaces, make lots of stuff, work on some new experimental stuff, and do lots with the huge glass order I placed two weeks before Xmas.

I've managed to find time to make a few new marbles too!

The one big hold at the moment is a big order of coloured borosilicate glass, which left the USA warehouse on the 12th January. By 14th it had got to 'forwarded to exporter,' where it seemed to remain until 2nd, when on-line tracking said 'arrived in UK.' I finally heard today, on month later, it might have actually got through customs and just requires me to pay up for tax and duty before I can git my mitts on it!

In the meantime I have got some small degree of organisation going in the workshop. First on the list was the ever expanding quantity of jars containing frit and powder. I have quite alot of old baby food jars with special lids for plant micro-propagation (long story!)  These are ideal as they are designed to be removed with one hand, so I can easily pop the lid off one that I need to use whilst the other hand is holding a rod of hot glass ready.

Before

What I obviously needed was some kind of spice rack. I'd previously tried a 'lazy Susan' rotating stand to hold them, but it just seemed to take up too much desk room. The result isn't very neat or well made, but it does the job! The before and after photos show how much tidier it looks already!

I didn't realise how much frit I'd acquired, some of them only have a little left, so I'll use those up and start transferring over to all having the same jars. Luckly the commercial small 4oz Northstar jars are about the same height too, as I know I'm going to end up with some more of those too!

After

The slightly bigger job was to sort out rod storage for the incoming 26lb box of glass (yes, I went a little crazy with the ordering, but I figured it would keep me going for quite a while.)  It also became a bigger job as the table that it was going to go under had a strengthening bar that was in the way. In the end I replaced the table completely, it was quite old and rickety. A pack of 40mm plastic pipe chopped up into lengths has made a nice neat 60 storage holes, but I've left space above as I'd like to extend this later on. I probably should have gone for slightly wider tubing, some of the colours may have to take up 2 slots for now, but the 50mm came in dull grey rather than white. At the bottom I've left wider sections to keep the more bulky supplies of tubing.

Apart from this the other major January job has been to get the dust off my Etsy shop. If you check my Facebook page regularly you may have noticed I've gone listing crazy, as I try to get lots of variety and a range of items back into my Etsy shop. I've been aware for a while now how little I manage to list, Greenwich seems to have taken up an awful lot of time and energy this past year, so I'm taking a few weekends off over the quieter months to try and catch myself up in advance - if that makes sense!

Tiny Marbles, Big Horizons

In the midst of getting my Etsy shop back and alive with new glass in it, I've had a lot of interest in very small galaxy marbles. These days I try to avoid making really big or really little marbles; it doesn't matter how big I make a marble I always get people asking if I can make them even bigger. I not sure if they even want to buy them, I think people just want to see football sized marbles! I used to try and pump them up as much as I could, often loosing some of the nice optical illusions and depth because I pushed them too far. Not to mention the hours twirling a hot heavy marble trying to get it into shape!

I've also try to avoid doing small ones, unless it's a quick test of a new colour or technique, when they start getting under about 20mm they become really tricky to hold and shape well. And to be blunt, despite the work involved, because of the small size people expect them to be sold for pennies. So these days I try to go for a comfortable balance between sizes, going often for the size the marble wants to be.

Then about a month ago I had an interesting enquiry from a chap who was re-creating the 'Men In Black' Orion's Belt prop. For those few people who haven't seen the movie, it's a little metal pendant that hangs from a cat's (a cat called Orion) collar, inside which is a little marble which contains an entire miniature galaxy. Well, it is a sci-fi/fantasy film!

I've had a few requests like this in the past, but what has made this different is that he's been using 3D printing techniques to produce it. As yet I've not seen the kit or bits, but I've had several enquires asking for marbles 18mm or smaller!

Setting to work to make some I soon realised why I try not to work at this scale, to start with I couldn't make anything smaller than 20mm, but a few more fails and I was starting to get the hang of the smaller ones. The next problem has been trying to get the detail into them. Many of the colours I use don't work when thinned down this small. Some of the colours just vanished, others just refused to play. I had this problem before with opaque reds in flower marbles which go from vibrant colour to a mud red when they thin out. Even the dichoric glass became a problem as it's really a very thin metal coating on sheets of 3-5mm glass. This needs to have another layer of glass locked over it, sometimes 2 or 3 layers in a sandwich, so suddenly there is 6-10mm of glass. It doesn't sound much, but throw in backing colours that add up to 3mm of glass at the base, and that it's only at the extreme equator of the marble that's the thickest part and suddenly every mm counts!

They are getting better, and more detailed, as I find tricks and colours that let me get around these problems. I don't think I am ever going to ever exactly copy the CGI created original, which I know it what the people making these props really want! In the meantime it's been quite interesting to make them at such extremes, and they've seemed to go down well with marble and glass collectors too.

 While all this has been going on I've had to drastically increase my shipping charges to USA & Canada, so that I can send parcels tracked and signed for, as I've had an awful run of packages not turning up. One of these was a commission for tiny marbles as well, which were even smaller and a nightmare to make. A compensation claim from Royal Mail can take months, (and I've had them wanting to prove how much it costs in materials to make) but it's letting down customers I hate most. I'm not using small envelopes anymore either, larger ones stops them being slipped into pockets, and gives more room for all the Post Office stickers! I once had a parcel from the USA with 14 USPS and PO stickers on it, so I've no idea how many end up on the ones I send to USA!

I'm going to try and add a few more, but I will have to stop adding to my Etsy shop for a while. Along with the run up to Xmas I have the MCM Expo at the end of October which I am frantically getting ready for, plus being at Greenwich! I may not be at Greenwich on some Sundays to give me chance to get ready, but I will try and make Saturdays (and possibly some Fridays too so I can avoid travelling to London during rail engineering works!)

New Work Space

Excuse the lack of blog update for the past few weeks, but
I've been moving! No, not house, but workshop.

I hadn't realised how little space I've been working in,
until I wanted to find somewhere for the new kiln, and find somewhere to spread
out the parts for some Steampunk sculptures. Until now the only spare space has
been the top of the kiln, not really an ideal workspace! It was actually on
suggestion from "the other 'alf" who felt that as I was working in
there 24/7 it only made sense I took over the spare bedroom/study which was
being used more for storage than any work! She also rather fancied this smaller
room as her office too. A quick advert in the local paper and the sofa bed was
gone, and then the grand move around could begin.

It's still work in progress, I've spread out a bit but I
still realise there isn't quite as much room as I thought, but I have managed
to put in a massive 6x3ft table to work on, in addition to the lampworking
bench! My old room is finally getting a makeover and decorate, and is already
filling up with books that until now have been spread around the house.

I've been able to drag out some old bits of treasured
electronic 'tat' too, including my Denko 1946/7 shortwave valve radio. It's an
amazing radio, I snapped it up years ago for £5.10 when I was still at college;
it really should have cost a lot more, however I got it in an auction and the
guy I was bidding against seemed to have got distracted and didn't realise he'd
been outbid by 10p! I remember listening to radio Australia
in the mornings between 8 and 9.30am
before the signal faded as the sun interference increased and the signal faded
out.

One thing I haven't set up yet is a photographic corner, so
still no new listings yet, but I've been working like mad so it shouldn't be
too long before I can start refilling my Etsy shop. I have been playing with
the new kiln, and have managed to try out a few kiln casts.

Its quite exciting
and nerve racking to do, I feel like I've got lots to learn, but have managed
to make a few nice casts already. I will hopefully add a new dimension and
styles of glass to add to what I already make, there will be much more about
this to come!

Stourbridge Busman's Holiday

Last week I went on a Busman's day out to Stourbridge to meet up with some fellow lampworkers from Frit Happens Forum, and for a whirlwind visit of some of the glassy attractions there. Stourbridge was (and still is to some degree) the centre of glassmaking in England, and is jam packed with studios, factories, workshops and museums.

Of course it's no short haul for me, so finding I could get a bargain room at £15 for a night in a nearby hotel in Dudley I decided to go up the afternoon before so I'd be fresh for the 9 am start, then amble back the day after and give myself a little break in the process.

Despite the confusing buses, and a change at a bus depot, I managed to find my way there. I think Dudley must be one of the Midlands best kept secrets, I took a wrong turning coming out of Dudley Port station; one minute I am in the middle of houses, noise and traffic, next minute I'm standing by a canal with nothing in site either way!

View left, view right!

The hotel was similar; it was right on a main road, but when I wandered off looking for dinner I found this;

Next morning was then a ten minute bus ride into Stourbridge, and meeting up with about 24 lampworkers and jewellers who'd travelled from all over for the day. We started at Ploughden and Thompson's, a glass factory that still makes raw glass, using a traditional cone chimney kiln as their factory (although the top of the chimney was removed in the 1920's). However they use modern techniques and kilns now, while we were there the glass blowers were making very high grade glass for a neutron detector array that's being built under the alps.

Neutron array detectors freshly made!

They explained how they have to use a low background radioactivity sand from Norway that costs about £4,500 per tonne, unlike the normal sand which is about £400 a tonne! Most of their work is producing glass for scientific, medical and military use; they showed us an array of goods from light covers that go in submarines, on fighter aircrafts, high power microwave generators for cancer treatment machines - it was quite an array! They even showed us what looked like flecks of glass, but were tiny glass tubes with a 12 micron hole for use in IVF treatment!

An array of their wares, top right is the finished neutron detector with a selienum internal coating, bellow that the cover from a fighter jet wing indicator lamp, centre is a high power microwave generator from a cancer treatment machine.

They do also make some decorative glass, and include Tudor glass which makes cut lead crystal.

Lesley has a go at glass cutting under the expert eye of Tutor Glass's lead crystal cutter

After chatting to the cutter and sandblaster, and having a go (I had a go at sandblasting, and was way too heavy on the controls! But I still want a sandblaster for xmas!) we had just enough time for a quick look around the storage rooms.

Sadly they'd had rain damage recently as thieves had taken the lead off their roofs, and at this point we just ran out of time. Probably a good thing, as I'd have gone shopping for glass at this point!

From here next stop was a tour of the Cone Museum, the last remaining intact glass cone in the UK.

This was a fascinating tour, seeing how glass was originally produced in what look an almost lethal environment! There was so much to see, and a chance to watch Charlotte, their resident glass blower, in action,

before being whisked off for a much needed sit down and lunch!

And that's only halfway through the day! I'll continue this in the next post, as I have some amazing pictures from the next two stops to come, of both old and new glass, and more from the Cone too!

In the meantime I am refilling my Etsy shop at the moment, and there should be a few more bits going in there, including some new marbles and paperweights, over the next few days.

Craftpimp & the Wonderfull metalwork of Anna McDade

I've recently joined craftpimp http://www.craftpimp.co.uk , which is a new forum devoted to craftspeople, and is a very freindly place too! As part of that a new Etsy team has sprung up, however it's a select affair! Only three of any discipline are allowed in at any time, and numbers will be limited to around 50 people in total. I've been very fortunate in being one of the few hardglass lampworkers who've been accepted onto the team!

One thing I really like about it is the diversity of top quality skills, and I hope to go around the whole team to share some of the delights with you (if you can't wait, put in the 'cpteam' tag in Etsy's search to see what's on offer!) However one that I couldn't wait to share is the amazing metalwork of Anna McDade.

Along with illustrations Anna produces some really drool worthy metal jewellery using silver, bronze, brass, gold and copper in ways that knocks socks off anything I've seen for a very long time. Some pieces just scream 'add me to a Steampunk/Victorian/Cyberpunk outfit NOW' like her copper and silver collar.http://www.etsy.com/listing/33321897/copper-and-silver-collar If it was plain it would be wonderful, but she also etches the copper with her own designs too. If that wasn't enough she even gives a choice of images that she puts on the designs.

If plain colour isn't your thing then check out the copper bracelets and cuffs (I certianly have!) which by giving heat treatments she has added some wonderful patina. I know alot of people wear copper bracelets to help with reumatism, but these are so much more stylish than the bangles my local chemists and new age shop sells.http://www.etsy.com/listing/52619630/large-copper-bird-on-the-wing-banglecuff (Picture at top of the blog! The one bellow is floating cityscape http://www.etsy.com/listing/70575988/medium-copper-floating-city-cuff )

Now I could rave on for ages, but I think it's best you go and have a look for yourself, especially as if you buy some of her bracelets and rings it'll remove temptation from me hitting the 'buy' buttons! It's certainly a treat for the eyes to see such quality and unquiqueness.

Be a Revolutionary Rebel - Make and Buy One-off's!

Black Gilson Opal Heart inside red Pendant

Recently I applied to some of the 'professional' selling sites, the ones that go after adverts and write-ups in the glossy posh women's magazines as the place to buy from. Initially I was a bit disappointed that they weren't interested in what I have, but thinking about it again I can see how what I do doesn't suit their way of working, The more I think about it, the more I realise I am probably the complete opposite of what they do!

Everything I make ends up being a one off. It doesn't mater if I try to do the same thing twice to make a pair (now you see why I don't list many earrings!) each piece is always slightly different in some way. My curiosity often gets in the way too, 'what if I add green to the next one, or add this, or take that out?' and suddenly I'm making a one off again. If I put my mind to it I can make several flower marbles in a row, but even if they are the same colour they end up with the petals and shapes slightly different.

ZOOM!! Rocket pendant -listed st Etsy Store

For those who like one-off's this isn't a problem, but when listed in a glossy magazine I can see how that might be a problem. I remember an Orchid seller I used to know having the same problem when trying to win a contract with a large well-know chain store. Although he won on them being raised in England, he couldn't guarantee that each plant would be the same, which is what they wanted for them to all match on the shelf, so they went with a Dutch grower instead.

One of the things I found great about doing the stall last week was that people were so excited to be able to buy pendants that they knew were one off's. I'd forgotten what an usual and rare thing that has now become in our mass-produced society.

Tadpole Squiggle galaxy - listed at Folky

Not being able to 'knock out' twenty closely matching flowers does mean that I photograph and list each item individually. This week I re-jigged my photo setup for the twentieth time, as I seemed to spend hours taking photos that still weren't any good! Finally I've got a set up I am happy with, (for now!) and I'm getting more consistent photo's, and each is taking a lot less time too. This means I've been able to crack on and list the HUGE stash of pendants I've made recently, and start to re-fill my Etsy and Folksy stores.

I guess I'll never be a 'designer' with people wearing exactly the same handbag with the same logo in every city, but I know that when I box up and post out a pendant or a bottle stopper that the person at the other end is getting something unique, and that gives me a warm glow in itself. It's almost as if I'm being an underground rebel against the mass-produced culture! Viva La Revolution!

All Change!

You may have notice I’ve been a little quiet on the blogging and listing front of late. I can now reveal some good news of some enormous changes which will hopefully mean both those things can improve!

I am now no longer commuting for the ‘day job!’ Instead I have taken on a project which is entirely non-office based, and everything will be done on the interweb! I still can’t quite believe it myself, and still wonder when I’ll be told it’s all off and to get back on the commuter un-merry-go-round! Although these first weeks (and my internet/twitter/blogging etc silence) are a bit mad as I spend a lot more hours getting things started, it does mean a huge quality of life improvement for me as well as getting me nearer to the point I can dump ‘the day job!’

Apart from the financial saving, the saving in time is a huge boon to me. Already I’ve had a few evenings that I’ve been able to get on the torch and play around with new ideas, rather than rush around doing chores or just being so shattered I fall into bed. I thought it might take a few weeks to have an effect but already I have got a lot of new ideas and directions I want to go with the glass.

To prove the point I’ve made an entirely new style of pendant with shapes that I really love! They are so much more organic, like seedpods or tropical flower buds, and I’ve developed a different way to capture this nebula look. There was a bit of hesitation when I first did this, but I took a leap of faith and here’s the result! I was actually more nervous about making the second one in case it was a fluke and I couldn’t make it again!

This past week I think I’ve done some of my best work for a very long time. I feel the reduction in stress and travel hours has made a difference already, and just at a time I want to start taking my glass in some new and exciting direction too. Even things like getting photos taken so I can start listing some of them is easier when I can do it during a needed tea break between looking at spreadsheets. It really feels like I’ve got a large chunk of my life back.

And then I found out I’ve been featured on Joy Funnel’s blog too at Fired With Imagination! http://joyfunnell.blogspot.com/2010/05/strangely-startling.html Joy is a maestro with silver clay and fresh back from Japan where she’s been seeing how silver clay is made. So it’s quite a treat to see that she has a complete set of jewellery – earrings AND bracelet – made with some of my Steampunk beads! And very good timing as I've been working on a new idea for Steampunk beads too. Now that’s a good end to a good week!

Random Notes of Tea Breaks

Despite deciding not to list so much on Etsy, that’s exactly what I’ve gone and done! Within the space of a few days I’ve pretty much doubled the amount of listings there, plus tweaked the prices on a few where exchange rates have changed, or old things I’m fed up of looking at!

I’ve also listed some of the new pendants I’ve been making, which I am really rather pleased how they are now coming out. I’ve cut down the failure rate, but I am taking a lot more time over them now. Originally I planned to add chains or nice leather cord with silver findings but they took ages to turn up, so I’ve listed them now as an ‘optional extra’ as I know some people just want the pendants to add to their own necklaces. Somewhere I’ve got a stiff silver choker, I am sure one would look great on that, but the grand tidy-up scheme seems to be taking a lot longer than planned! I was going to do blitz listings of old bits and bobs, but it seems to take ages to get everything photographed, and I so easily get distracted by ideas to try. I found a white marble when sorting through that I saved as it gave me a brilliant idea – I just need to remember what it was!

You can find my Etsy shop at http://www.etsy.com/shop/steampunkglass

In aid of my memory I’ve got back into the habit of carrying a little notebook and a nice pen to scribble away in. I seem to be filling it up nicely. I normally jot notes on backs of envelopes, but my other half got me a selection of little books which are really nice to use as well as keep all these ideas together. I am not sure how useful any of it is, but it’s a nice way to turn ideas over in my mind with a cup of tea and a slice of cake! I seem to have developed a rather odd habit lately of really fancying cake when I’m having a session on the torch. I’ve given in and started buying a Victoria jam sponge especially for those long weekend sessions! Not doing my waistline much good, but with a cup of Lady Grey it makes very civilized tea breaks! Here’s a page out of my mad tea ramblings, I’ve picked one of the clearer and less messy pages!

How Low Can I Go?

Occasionally I get asked if I can do something special or different in glass. Many are to revisit and remake old favourites, but some are for new twists on things I’ve already made. It’s always interesting to hear new ideas, and they often take me down paths I wouldn’t have expected to explore.

The ones that seem easy often turn out to be the most problematic! Recently I was asked if I could make a red flower in a marble. Now I don’t normally try to do specific flower, mine are more ‘impressions’ of a flower, but this seemed such a simple construction, I thought ‘No problem!’ How wrong I was!

After about the 9th marble, I finally got the shape to start working, about the 12th I think I pretty much nailed it. It just goes to show how Mother Nature is rather more clever than we think, and how complex simplicity is! I won’t tell you what the flower is, as this is for someone else’s special project. My next problem is trying to get the colour right, which again turns out harder than expected. I bought a sample pack of Northstar’s boro colours which I use as a palette of colours. There are about 110 or more colours, then added to that I have most of the TAG colours, some Northstar experimental colours, plus the odd bit of Borostik, Glass Alchemy and Momka colours! Basically anything I can get my hands on! Out off all these different makers and different reds I was surprised how so many of them turned the same dull colour in use. Further investigation found that I wasn’t the only one finding this, when thinned down all these opaque reds returned to a rather bland dull brick red. There are some rather sexy reds in transparent, but as yet I haven’t got them to work with an opaque base to make a good red. I shall persevere!

Then the other day I had a less promising question. Could I make vortex marbles smaller? About 9-14mm? I thought not, but tried anyway. Unsurprisingly the first attempts were blobs of glass that fell onto the pie tin I keep under my torch to catch wandering bits of hot glass. However I tried again the next day, running the torch at lower pressures, using the same techniques I’d use on a full sized one but with tiny 4mm glass rods. I was so surprised when it worked! I even managed to put some aventurine sparkles inside them, although they work quite well plain a this size too. The first one was about 15mm, but it didn’t take long to start getting them down to 10mm!

Having achieved what I set out to do, the obvious question popped into my head; how low could I go? I thought 9mm was as small as it could go before I started loosing the design. However I got one to 8.65mm (according to my digital callipers!) Then a touch under 8mm, then an insane one which should have been 6mm! I really hit the edge of what was possible with this one, I couldn’t get the bottom to polish off properly so it’s the only one with a ‘dented bottom!’ Also when I measured it I found it has squashed slightly where I’d held it in tweezers as I’d tried to finish it, so one side is 5.76mm the other is 6.06mm! The results are shown here, the 10.5mm green one is my favourite, although the photos don’t really do justice to them as my camera wasn’t happy with focusing this small either!

And yes, that is a 5p coin!!!

I will play with this some more soon, apart from my other half wanting a pair as ear studs, I want to see if I can do some of my other designs small to make a range of real glass micro-paperweights for Dolls houses. I need to clean up and simplify some of the designs first, but they are such fun to do I really can’t resist trying them out! I am hoping to get more workshop time soon, if I can do them without having to charge too much (it's quite labour intensive) then I will probably list them on Esty in the next few weeks.

Whats in a name?

One of the first things I tried making in glass where heart beads. However my first efforts were rather ‘unfortunate’ so I was delighted to come across a new way of forming them freehand a little while ago. What I particularly like is the little hanger which adds an almost Victorian flourish to them, plus (when I get them right) the space between makes another heart shape! I still can’t get them quite even, but I’m probably being fussy! In fact I’ve just made one deliberately uneven, which I like it more than the even ones as I think it has more character!

Borosilicate colours can be really odd; because of the weird way they react with light they look different depending on the light source, the direction of the light, what’s behind the glass and so on. I’ve had to start taking photos with them on both white and black backgrounds to give a true impression of how these look. Under daylight the purple lustres come out (I guess it’s something to do with UV) but put them in front of a white card and they vanish again!

One of the colours I’ve been using to get really rich purple lustres is called ‘Silver Creek,’ which I had to order in direct from USA as no one stocks it over here. Before that I was using double purple and triple purple passion and still not getting the zing I wanted. I think it’s called ‘Silver Creek’ because it’s got a lot of silver in the formulation, but doesn’t really help tell you what colour it will be!

Boro colour makers have gone wild with their naming, I guess because all the ‘normal’ glass has got all the sensible names already! I’ve got rods with names like ‘Alien Blood’ (green-white) ‘Unobtainium’ (an amazing pearlised blue) ‘Steel Wool’ (glittery grey) even ‘Red Elvis’ a transparent red which sounds like it should be a Cold War Communist version of the King of Rock & Roll!

These odd names are rather handy as it helps me to remember what the colours do as unlike normal soft glass they don’t look the same as when they are melted in. Many of the rods are so dark they look dark blue or even black, but when used do strange things instead, even turning cream coloured! The older colours tried to have helpful names, but Green Amber Purple isn’t a great name – and this glass starts out Bristol Blue coloured plus I’ve not yet got any purple out of it either, although wonderful creams, yellows, ambers, blues and greens!. I try to label every boro rod, but I do end up scrabbling around for a certain colour with one hand while holding a hot marble in the other, so there can an element of serendipity as I end up using another colour instead.
At least these colours live up to, and often exceed, their wonderful mad names. Many years ago I was helping stack paints, all had been given glamorous emotive names like ‘harvest barley’ (a sort of yellow off-white) and ‘seagulls wing’ which turned out to be a very boring grey!