AlaskanFireworker

Alaskan wildflower bowls

2008-08-31T23:07:00.001-08:00

I've always wanted to
put fireweed and lupine in glass....so this is my first try.

2008-04-26T23:19:00.001-08:00

Not terribly thrilled with this one...kinda cheesy don't you think?...but maybe someone will like it...you just never know what people will like. I did this one late at night...I think I was asleep actually.

2008-04-26T23:12:00.002-08:00

Here are a few new plates I've made for the silent auction next weekend for the Irish Dance Academy fundraiser....including showing the "before firing" and after slumping.

2008-03-21T00:13:00.002-08:00

These were made for a silent auction for the Irish dance school.
This was made for a friend Cindy who collects rocking horses.
This was made for Kyle.
This was made for Corinne

2008-03-20T23:41:00.000-08:00

I've always wanted to make set of dinner plates....so I made these for a friend Patricia in NYC.
This book "Princess Cinnamon" was published to raise funds for kids with cancer.
The plate I made as a surprise for the woman who wrote the book.

beer logos for Warren

2008-03-04T23:05:00.000-09:00

This is the poster for a local brewery's ale that Warren and I both love called Monk's Mistress.
So I 'borrowed' the logo and using glass frit I put the design in glass.
This is one of Warren's other favorite brews. I made these two to hang in his bar.

A few new projects

2008-03-04T22:56:00.000-09:00

These are glass coasters I made for a friend who just bought her first place.

This I made by gluing a paper doily to the glass and sprinkling with ground green glass frit...then removed the doily...addd some dichroic frit and fired at 1,525F.
Then I slumped it at 1,225F.
This I made for a friend in Hawaii who is a LOST fan.

2007-10-01T23:19:00.000-08:00

2 bowls in the process for silent auctions

2007-10-01T18:55:00.000-08:00

Here are a few pictures to show more of the process of making a fused glass bowl or plate.

Starting with a circle of sheet glass and adding layers of either strips of glass or ground glass frit.

Then firing the first firing to make a flat disc of fused glass and then slumping into a slumping mold for the final shape of a plate or bowl. One of these is for a silent auction at church and the other is for a silent auction for the Anchorage Senior Center.

2007-08-28T23:54:00.000-08:00

This is a plate I made for a choir director who I think is in Arkansas. This was a 12 inch clear circle of glass with stringers for the music bars, orange/yellow and blue and green frit, coarse frit for the notes, liquid glass for the lyrics and little pieces of dichroic glass for the bars dividing the measures. Hopefully you can read the lyrics.

This is clear glass with several different colors of glass frit and glass stringers. Fused and then slumped.

What to do with scraps of glass

2007-08-28T23:47:00.000-08:00

These are just a small number of the fused glass barrettes , little heart dishes, spoonrests and soapdishes I made with left over pieces of glass. The little heart dishes I've been giving to my best girl friends

This little dish was made by my daughter Hope. She used frit, stringers and also some of the little whimseys we made with a torch.

Hope and I were messing around with a blow torch and stringers. The torch pretty much ruled...I had no control over what I was doing except the thorny flower stems at the bottom.

Stuck on stripes

2007-08-28T23:27:00.000-08:00

I got stuck on a stripes theme for awhile. I cut strips of glass and laid them ontop of each other on top of a circle of glass I'd cut out.

This plate you can see the beginning of it below in my first post. This was a 12 inch circle of clear glass. Then I cut out strips of glass and layered them on top. Then I added a strip of dichroic glass. I think I made this for my friend Deb in Madison.

This bowl reminds me of grape jolly ranchers. It was also made with strips of glass. This is a sort of verrigated glass with many colors in it.

This strips of blue and moss green were laid on top of a circle I cut out of opaque white glass. I have no recollection of what I did with this plate.

This was my "Christmas series" of plates that we made for Christmas presents a couple of years ago. Then the family made cookies and we mailed them off. The plates arrived safely...but the cookies were in crumbs.

2007-08-28T22:35:00.000-08:00

This little square dish I made for my oldest daughter. "Mister Dog" was one of her favorite books as a little girl. Its all ground glass frit except the "goldenbook binding" which is copper "liquid glass" with black frit on top.

I made three of these "fairy garden" plates. the first one I made was meant to be an underwater scene but somehow it got away from me and seemed more jungle like. It has little curvy strips of glass cut out as well as lots of liquid glass and glass frit.

This plate was made for Melody also. It also got an ominous bubble in the middle. I think that's now three plates ruined with over firing bubbles.

This plate was made for my daughter's sixth grade teacher. It was blue glass for the base and then I cut out pieces and layered them on top...so some parts are three layers thick. I decided not to fuse this to a "full fuse" so it would have some texture/layered effect. Unfortunately I don't think she liked it...but she said her mother loved it.

This plate was for a friend "Turtle" who collects turtles. this is also glass frit with liquid glass for outline of the shell.

2007-08-28T21:53:00.000-08:00

This is a plate for my friend "Shakes". This is made with glass frit and "Liquid glass" for outline on clear glass. This was before it was fired. This plate also developed a really nasty bubble in it. I was screaming mad. "Shakes" is a 7th grade honors English teacher and I wasn't going to give it to her since it "failed" but I thought maybe she could use it as a teaching example.. if at first you don't succeed....try try again????

This plate was made for my friends Melody and Steve. First I fired the heart shapes using frit in a heart shaped mold. Then I placed these hearts on top of "glass confetti" on top of clear glass. .

This was made for a friend that loves Jack Russell terriers. Hers is named Boo. Well this plate ended up having a boo boo.....I fired it too hot on the fusing and it developed a bubble in the middle. I have made this mistake a few times and it makes me wonder if I'll ever learn from my mistakes.

This is before any firings. Its a clear glass round with white and blue frit and "liquid glass" used for the poles and skis. This ended up being a bowl.

This plate was made with a clear circle and then glass stringers and frit.

This plate was made for no particular reason when I was sorting through my scrap pieces of glass. Because glass is so incredibly expensive to ship to Alaska, I don't throw any away. So I just pretty much threw the scraps on the clear glass and fused it.

This bowl was made for a silent auction for the Irish Dance Academy. It is an 8 inch round clear glass with ground glass frit and some "liquid glass" on the dancer with frit on top.

This bowl I made for a Minnesota Vikings fan. In this picture the slumping process has not been done yet. Once the bowl was done I filled it with matching M&Ms.

2007-08-28T10:37:00.000-08:00

For my pilot friends that take me flying I've made 3 of these glass bowls of a small plane in a sunset using an 8 inch clear glass circle with orange, reds and black glass frit.

This plate was made using a clear 12 inch circle of glass with iridescent strips of glass placed on top.

This plate was made for my nephew who is a "birder". Its a 12 inch circle of glass with glass frit and "liquid glass". Its then fused at 1,500F the first firing and then slumped at 1,200F for the 2nd firing.

This was made for another "birder" using all glass frit on top of a clear circle of glass.

This plate was made for a girlfriend's surprise 60th birthday. I started with a 12 inch clear glass circle of glass and sprinkled rose colored frit. I also used "liquid glass" to make the restaurant's logo and the birthday wish and quote. I fired it at 1,500F so it became just one piece of glass. Then at the party I had all the other women write their names on the glass using the "liquid glass" and then fired it again. Then for the 3rd firing I slumped it into a plate mold.

How it all starts

2006-06-27T23:18:00.000-08:00

First to start a fused glass design you must choose your glass. There are many different types of glass, but whichever is chosen...they must all be compatible. I use Bullseye glass which is 90 COE. The COE stands for Coefficient Expansion. This has to do with how the glass contracts as it cools. If two glasses are combined that don't contract at the same rate, then the glass will shatter after or during the cooling. Sometimes it can be a month later.

Now, back to the types of glass. There is flat glass and ground glass called "frit" and stringers/noodles which look like spaghetti or fettucini noodles. There is also "liquid glass" which is very finely ground glass in a liquid suspension. They come in all sorts of colors, transparent, opaque, translucent. Also there is iridescent and dichroic.

To make a plate or bowl you can start with a round flat piece of glass for the base. Then you can add additional layers on top with more flat glass, frit, stingers etc. Then this is fired in a kiln at around 1,400 F.

After this is fused it becomes one flat piece of glass. Then this is placed on top of a slumping mold and fired a second time at about 1,300 F, where gravity pulls the softened glass into the mold and thn cools slowly.