The Ultimate Glass Art Creation ... The Glass Fashion Show

This is a bucket-list item. If you work glass, hot, warm or cold - at least once in your life you should attend this. Even better - would be to participate!

Going to this will make you feel like you are partying on the Riviera. Nevermore will you be awed by celebrity events. You will watch Fashion Week and the Oscars and Emmy night and Ecstasy Raves and Lady Gaga Concerts and think to yourself - "Ha! I've been to the Glass Fashion Show!"

And you might not want to put it off - because Laura keeps swearing that each one she does will be the last.  

Two years - that is long enough to make the costume. What would you do ... if you were to make a fabulous wearable art piece - in glass? Glass Corset? Cinderella Slipper Hat? Medusa Snake Dress? Crocheted Wire Ballgown with a Handmade Bead in every stitch? Think of the possibilities - then email Laura and pitch your idea! (Email address in the graphic below.)

Photography Trick

Here's a kind of fun little trick for photographing beads outside in bright sunshine - always good for showing them off, but keeping a nice clean, uncluttered background.

It looks like I'm holding them up to the sky, right? And then messed with the exposure to get a dark sky for contrast.

Actually - I am shooting them against the backdrop of the windows of my van. The tinted side windows reflect a darker version of the sky, giving me a clutter free backdrop, with nice contrast. I was holding the beads about 18 inches away, making it easy to find a position where I am not shooting my own reflection.

Easy. And if you don't have a van with tinted windows, surely someone on the block does. Way to get funny looks from the neighbors, wandering around taking pictures of someone else's vehicle. ;-)

Sundered Heart

Just a little eye-candy tonight. I don't get much play-time on the torch these days - heck - I don't get much time on the torch at all - so just sharing these.

The sundered heart, you may remember - is a tribute to heartbreak - pain and sorrow and having to carry on.

Kind of a heavy burden for glass.

Emergency Bead Rescue

Don't you just hate it when you spend a lot of time on a bead, and then, after it is out of the kiln, something dumb happens like you crack the end pulling it off the mandrel. Argh.

This was an flamework and enameled, sculpted goddess figure that I cracked and chipped the bottom bead hole on. I had it on my bench when I was trying to figure out what to do with some left-over 2-part epoxy clay. I fashioned a quick tail and turned the bead into a pendant, added some swarovski rhinestone scales, and the brushed gunmetal loop at the bottom was a bead that happened to match the grey glass of the bead perfectly.

In order to pull it all together, I think I might have to go back and do something at the top of the bead, but you can see, the mixed media approach has some potential for salvaging an otherwise scrapped bead!For sure I will glue a looped bail into the top to hang it from.

Two-part epoxy clay - there are various brands, Apoxie, Crystal Clay, and Ceralun (Swarovski's house brand). They are all good. My personal preference is the Ceralun - it has the nicest colour and working characteristics. Not the most colours - but the colours it has are awesome. Apoxie is my second favorite (well, my fave until I found the Ceralun), good working characteristics and a fair range of colours. Crystal Clay has more colours, but I find it a bit gooey to work with. But I'm talking subtle differences here. They are all strongly adhesive, so they stick to the glass without any additional product, and that's what is holding the rhinestones too. It cures overnight without any additional heating. Read the instruction on the box - it's dead easy to use.

Effetre 227 Caribbean Sea - Old batch vs New Batch

 Caribbean Sea is a layered colour, a transparent core with an opaque outer layer. The result is a lovely, streaky look when worked. The more you work it, the better it looks.

The new batch is a little different, so I tried them side by side. One end of the bead is the old batch, and one end is the new, BUT, I'm sorry, I lost track of which was which.

But they are both really pretty. If you love blues and greens, you'll love this glass - whichever batch you get! 

Effetre Ebony & Ivory

Just a quick note - find this glass and buy all of it that you can!

This is Ebony and Ivory, and appears to be layered rods of ivory and intense black. There are different batches of it - I think I might have gotten some "D" batch.

It is freakin' awesome - it looks like - well - check out the photo, which I shot on my phone because I was so excited about these - it looks like silvered ivory.

No idea how long this will be available or if it will be a regular item.

Get this. Stockpile it. You've been told! Freakin' Awesome!