A Little Fused Glass

My BFF takes up hobbies.  She researches and perseverates over them until she has it all figured out, then she moves on to the next obsession.  I truly love her.

She called last week and said she found a fused glass class at a shop in Houston.  She wanted to drive down for the holiday early and attend the class.  I said, "do it, I'll go with you."

We drove to Tomball, Texas to Hot Glass Houston where we met the proprietor and course instructor, Bob.

Bob was a chatty guy, an excellent teacher and vastly patient with us both.  We asked endless questions and interrupted his prepared speech several times.  He was genuinely helpful and enthusiastic with a couple of beginners.

BFF has fused glass before.  She's taken several classes in Texas and North Carolina.  The phrase "enough knowledge to be dangerous" comes to mind.  I was mostly fascinated with making something out of 'recycled' glass.  I am always fascinated by making something from discards.

The glass we used was Tempered Glass (not laminated like car windshields) and once it is raised to temperature, it cannot be cut again.  So when they make window glass for commercial windows, they often make more than one pane for each opening, to cover the vagaries of construction.  These extra panels were what we used.

The fun part was breaking the glass.  We used one of these--you see them all the time in commercials for safe egress from wrecked cars.  The fun part was the 'laying on of hands'.  Bob invited us to come over and watch as he helped the first student wrap their glass panel up in a tarp.  Then we all laid our hands on the tarp wrapped glass and the student gently tapped the glass in a single place.  The glass shattered out from the point of impact.  You could feel it rippling through the pane under your palms.  The rest of the day, it continued to crackle and pop, like Rice Krispies.  Truly impressive.  We all wrapped our glass in the tarp and then shattered it with a single strike.  Then we started to layer up our broken glass on our kiln shelf.

We chose either a round or square shape and marked the paper.  Then we started moving the glass pieces around until we filled up the shape for the first two layers.  The top layer is more decorative.  That profile stays with the bowl during the two firings.  The first fuses the piece, the second slumps it into a bowl shape.  The glass is in the kiln for over a 100 hours!  I find that just amazing.

The finished product is very pretty.  I chose not to put any colored glass frit into my bowl.  The only color is the original tempered glass.  This picture is not great but you can see how the glass on the top layer kept its irregular shape and gives texture to the finished product.

I could fill this bowl with lemons and keep it on my kitchen table, but I chose to buy a stand and display it like an art piece.  I really enjoyed taking this class and learning how to do this fused glass bowl.  I'm thinking I might sign up for another class soon.  Hot Glass Houston has quite a few offerings that look really interesting to me.

--  Sandee Wagner