Crack in the World

The world cracked from side to side..... and around the middle, across the top, and everywhere else!

The terrible blog title comes from a 1964 sci-fi disaster movie, 'Crack In The World', but in this case it should be millions of cracks as I struggle to get some little world earrings made. Producing them is turning into a disaster movie of their own!

I've been wanting to get some of the glass that makes such lovely cloudy effects for while now, and about six weeks ago I ordered about 3/4lb of this precious glass that hardly anyone seems to stock from a European stockist. And yes, that's in old school pounds weight, as glass producers still use imperial measurements as if they are sweet-shops (which, for anyone who works with glass, they are really!)

So I waited, and waited, and waited a bit more. Without going too much into the sordid details after several weeks, a lack of communication from the supplier (which would have smoothed things considerably) I eventually had to take it to a paypal dispute to get my money back. I got the refund, but not the glass I really needed.

So, now it was an order into an American stockist, which turned out to be super fast. They recommended using DHL for a few extra dollars, and considering the delays I'd already had I figured it was better to have the glass as quickly as possible. The last order I'd had from The States came from USPS (US Postal Service) was still moving around in the USA in the first three days, this delivery was picked up from the USA warehouse at 4pm Wednesday afternoon (their time) and on my door step before noon on Friday! Amazing, even more considering the USA is half a day ahead of us too, so they lost time flying it here!

So, kiln on, 23ct gold leaf ready, and I start making worlds. Or rather, I don't. This batch seemed to be reluctant to make the nice cloudy effects, I made a good 20-30 or so to see how they came out, and switched to another type I had that doesn't always make such nice clouds. I expect a few to crack, normally they are straight in half, and the second batch were mostly fine, but the new glass I'd waited so long for was a disaster! As you can see from the photo's, they have some severe incompatibility cracks, normally caused by mixing two glasses with different expansion rates together (COE) which may be the clear I normally use. It's always been fine in the past, and worked with the other glass fine. I have tried emailing customer service of the factory, but they don't seem interested in answering their emails to tell me if they've had anyone else have problems with this batch.

So this means that little worlds are going to be delayed even longer now, whilst I figure this out, or try to get another brand of glass to perform the same tricks I could get out of this one. I've even been giving serious thought to making my own, it'll probably be quicker to get that way! I am experimenting with some new world designs though, so watch this space.

In the meantime, and on a more positive note, I am now finally getting my Etsy shop refilled. I've been posting on Facebook to let people know, although I've been doing so much I'm worried all my Facebook followers are going to start thinking I'm spamming them! There are lots of new pendants, marbles, a few pens and pins, although earrings may be in short supply for a few more weeks, however when there are they may be some more unusual designs, so keep an eye on my status!



Bah! A days work and loads of gold leaf wasted :-(

Colour my Blog

I seem to have had a ‘what was I thinking?’ day last week. Apart from a rather nasty increase in the amount of stuff cracking in the kiln (which needs some investigation in case something is seriously wrong, or it could be I just left the door open too long!) I seem to have made a very odd collection of bits. Normally I’d hope to find one of these experiments has produced something interesting to explore, this time I think they shall just be exploring my reject pile instead! I blame it on tidying the workshop, once it's back in a mess I hope normal service will be resumed!

However on a good note some of my blue little world earrings have made it onto a blog by Fiona at http://jewellerymydesign.blogspot.com/ where she has had the inspired idea of showcasing some Folksy sellers items by grouping them together by colour! I seem to have made ‘dark blue/ indigo’ colour theme! Well worth checking out her blog, I think she has made a better display of Folksy wares than we see normally on the Folksy front page! It also really shows the wealth and diversity of talent of makers we have in the UK.

Evil Ruler of The Kiln Galaxy

Small Blue Worlds
Originally uploaded by steampunkglass

It seems at the moment I am at my most productive on a Sunday. Saturday seems to start slowly, plus this weekend I was completely shattered which is not great for being creative. Sunday was a different matter! I cleaned down my work desk and decided to leave the boro flowers for a while to use up my soft glass stash. This was about the time I realised how much I’ve come to love off-mandrel working! Twiddling around sticks of bent metal that are covered in potential harmful dust is not ideal (although I still love the smell when first heated, reminds me of my first time bead making.)

Second bead and straight in with 101-stupid-mistakes! ‘Putting hot sticky bead into kiln and touching other hot bead.’ Not a good start, although I think I saved one of them, albeit after having to reshape it again.

So enough with normal beads, thought I’d make some more of my ‘little worlds,’ which I’ve had some nice comments back about this week. I’ve been meaning to make some more for a while, and to try out some new colour combos as well. Suddenly it all clicked again, and from having mandrels sitting around gathering dust, and bead release hardening in the pot, I actually had to raid my drawers for any more I could find – even some part bent ones! I’ve filled the kiln before, but never this much! The kiln turned into a little galaxy of Planets!

I’ve done a good few with the classic deep blue, (as per the picture here) plus more of a nice pale green peridot colour. I’ve not listed any of these yet as for some reason I can’t seem to get any of these to be a close size match yet. I have had a go with some more ‘Mars Red’ and some fab ‘Indigo’ – yet more new colours I have yet to unveil! However I left the best to last, and think I have come up with some of the best little worlds I have EVER made! Even ‘The Boss’ was blown away by them, and that takes some doing! I am really excited about the way these are going now, the three hours for the kiln to cool was torture last night! The only problem I have is I only have a tiny bit of this glass left, and when I checked this morning found out because of the high silver content it’s about 12 times the cost of the normal blue!!!! Ekk!!!!! I will have to ration this stuff!

I will get these cleaned up later this week so I can make some new earring with them, keep a look out for the pictures as these really are worth seeing, until then I’m going to be mean and leave you wondering about them - after all I seem to be Evil ruler of my very own universe of little planets now!