Sasha's Silver

Now here is a glass that you can spend a lot of time exploring the possibilities of - and a lot of money on too - this is one of the "exotic" soft glasses, weighing in at $100 USD/pound. Ouch.

However, look at the fun you can have with it - there is only one colour of glass in this picture.

OK - I'm stretching it a little - the two tablet beads have a little decoration that is not Sasha's Silver, (R4-12) and some of the spacers are encased in clear. Oh, and one of the bicones and the tablets have a black base, hidden under the glass, which is to save on glass, as it is so gosh-darned pricey!

Anyway - the point is that all these gorgeous blue, aqua and teal colours are coming from the same glass.

And the muddy taupe too.

In the rod, the glass is a turquoise colour, with layers in cross section - and if you just put it down and do nothing - it appears black. Not very exciting - as you can see from some of the spacers, above.

The fastest and most reliable way I have personally found so far to get the colours to appear, is to cool the glass rapidly, and reheat. The easiest way to do this, is to make a shape that needs to be marvered - such as the bicone. The colour may not show on the first marvering - but it should show shortly after. You will see it as you are working the bead - you don't need to wait for it to come out of the kiln to know if you got it.


Apparently, however, you can overwork it, and you get this rather muddy effort. (feathered pattern is opal yellow.) Some may like this, I might even like this, if I wasn't so enamored of the blue and aqua effect.

So far, I have not been able to "bring the colour back" from this, which is why, for now, I'm referring to it as "overworked."

As reactive glasses go, the colours are very rewarding and fairly easy to achieve. I'm going to be buying more and experimenting with it.

Rating - hmm - a rating system? Mandrels? Torches? Let's give this 4 torches for interest and ease of use, of a maximum 5. (Less one for the price!)