Slumped Glass Progress!

So I've made a few plates, spent a whack of cash and I am still not sure what I think about the process of glass. It's very much like putting lego pieces together and melting the whole thing in the oven. But somehow I think a little less messy and the product slightly prettier! Anyway, a few of you asked about the progress of the last plates so here they are:

Blue Glass Plate, The Sequel:

It pretty much looks like the last one, doesn't it? It's still bumpy on the top so I'm not sure my little shards of glass did very much to even it out. Maybe a little.

But something else happened:

Bubbles got caught between the layers of glass and shard, and the edges of the glass aren't as rounded as they were on the last plates. I don't really mind though. It's all part of being handmade, in my opinion.

This piece is in the kiln being slumped as we speak!

The Butterfly Plate:

This one survived the slumping. Funny, I expected it to be deeper. Rumour has it a visitor to the glass studio really liked it. There is hope for this little plate!

The Rockin' Transparent Sushi Plate:

This one broke the mould. Literally. Or Mitch broke the mould. When I went in this morning to check the kilns, the mould was on the table being glued back together. I don't think you can fix broken moulds. I'm pretty sure the glue will burn off in the kiln, but Mitch is going to give it a shot anyway.

It's too bad the mould broke, because I think this plate needed a second firing. As you can see, it's only slightly bent, but the "foot" that would have stopped it from rocking never appeared. So it is literally, a rockin' sushi plate. The control freak in me is frustrated by this, because I don't really know how to fix it other than re-firing it on a broken mould.

The other weird thing is that I placed ten tiny pieces of clear glass in the kiln to be melted into pendants. I wanted to smooth out the sharp edges but absolutely nothing happened to them. Sharp, sharp, sharp. I'm perplexed. I think I might give glass a rest for a little while and pick up the paint brush again and wait to see what happens with the blue plate. The Next Naramata painting is all drawn out and ready to be painted!

XXMelanie

Shades of Blue: The (Almost) Final Product!

The 'julienned' blue glass strips. Not at all even along the bottom, not exactly flush with the glass. I left the studio thinking these would be horrible but worth the experiment to see what the kiln would do to them.

These simple little coasters turned out really well. So well, they are finished! I just need some protective knobs on the bottom so tables don't get scratched. I love that they are completely smooth. It's got my mind churning for the next bigger projects!

Turned out pretty well for a first try! Completely smooth on all six sides!

I admit I kinda took the weekend off.I was feeling a little burnt out, a little under the weather. I visited with people, watched a movie with my mother, and went for a long walk with mom and Zoe where I collected every beautiful weed along the road I could find. I will sit down and draw them one of these nights. I'm a little fascinated with weeds in design at the moment.

Anyway, the one thing I did do was pick up the blue glass I put together. The blue one I made was packed more tightly than the red and it still worked out.I was worried it would all somehow run into one big blob of blue but it didn't. It's going to be slumped, I hope, though I admit I didn't take into consideration the crease where the side of the plate meets the bottom of the plate, but it's at such an incline I am not sure it will matter. Fingers crossed!

Before. (The grid this is all sitting on is made specifically for working with glass, the little shards fall into the grid so you don't get the shards in your fingers like you do if your, I don't know, working in the corner of the bedroom floor in the Emirates!

Now, but not finished! It's now waiting to be slumped.

The smoothness of the coasters has got me thinking about the plates now. If I can put a strip of clear glass between the blocks on these plates, the result would be a lot less bumpy. It will be a lot more work of julienning glass, but I think it might be the next glass project. This weekend I will be heading down to Vancouver to hang out with my sister who happens to live within walking distance of a glass store (important because there are none around here.)

My wheels are already turning! I might be on to something totally new!

XXMelanie