Back at my torch.....

PuRe CoLoR ThErApY is what I needed this morning and this is the result.....each color of each glass bead is melted onto a steel mandrel in various layers and designs, cooled in a controlled manner (annealed in a kiln), cleaned and sorted and ready to be incorporated into jewellery.  I start with a plan
but segue into many more.....

An order for fifteen of these hearts and a crayon colored necklace with one of my sterling silver
hand made chains.  I feel better now.... : > )

Something New....

The current trend for "bib" style jewellery and my own interest in jewellery and fiber art (just a little segue) from my painting resulted in this new design. Hand crafted organza petals and leaves sprinkled with tiny crystal beads and vintage pearls and chain. There's even a snippet of a love letter trapped within the layers of leaves. I've completed several versions of this style

including a silvery gray and rhinestone version for winter.

This is How It Starts....

Having recently discovered working with hot glass (in a small way), I take particular pleasure in knowing that Hudson, where I have lived for over thirty years was the site of a glass industry located on the shore of the Lake of Two Mountains. At it's height over a century ago, it was still possible (at least in the early years when I first moved here) to find colored glass while walking along the beach or just below the wharf.

I'm happy to have a place to work on my torch in my home even if it is in the basement. This is at it's messiest but it's a happy, colorful mess.





The glass starts out in rod form (as you see on my table next to the torch. Heated in the torch, it melts and I guide it on to a steel mandrel coated with a bead release formula that will let me slide the bead off later when completely cooled. After the base bead, several other colors can be added (a little like painting with molten glass) and texture can be left or completely melted in and then shaped into perfect little spheres, barrel shapes, squished between graphite paddles or even molded into presses. Lately I've been experimenting with sculpting the glass using small scale steel tools (steel because they can stand up to the heat taking care not to let them get so hot that they stick to the molten glass). Sculpting beads would be for the goddess type beads as an example which require shaping with the aforementioned tools as opposed to a symmetrical bead. Upon completion and while still so hot they've just lost the red glow, they are put into a fibre blanket to cool slowly to avoid thermal shock.
Then I gather together finished beads from the fibre blanket and slide them onto some mandrels to be put into the kiln to be annealed (takes the stress out of the glass that's accumulated during the time it's in the fire) although personally I find that part stressing myself......Finally they must have the bead release residue cleaned out of the holes before I can use them in jewellery.



.....and then the satisfying part....designing the finished product....

These are the days....

These are the days I'm going to miss in the dead of winter. I love being able to move outside and work on my projects.
Here I'm doing some hammering, best done outside in any case, and my barrel is just the right height for me. The projects I'm working on are for some jewellery pieces that require some embossing. The funny juxtaposition of my fish "out of water"
next to my newly discovered bird's nest didn't escape me and I found myself creating "fish beads" on my torch and sterling silver wire nests with tiny blue pearls as eggs....a creative segue from my task of embossing.....
I'll post the glass fish when they come out of the kiln.....
By the way, note that in Kate's blog, (Art Vein Vessel) she also has posted her collection of nests....!

Some of the vintage pieces that I have influenced some of the art work such as the antique Remington typewriter and the
doll size sewing machine.....and the last image of the hand in the jewellery cabinet was a gift to me of a trailing vine of
Morning Glories that krept in a barely opened window at one point in late summer and I couldn't bear to cut so I let it
grow and grow it did!......and bloomed in and around my cabinet.....a better display I couldn't have imagined.....