Glass fusing in Oxfordshire

22nd June 

I have a new addictive hobby and it has momentarily taken me away from crochet and I'm not talking

Boat coaster, fused glass, my first piece

about knitting either but glass fusing. 

Until a few weeks ago, I didn't really know what it was.  Looking back, I've always been drawn to glass, I remember one vivid holiday in Devon as a child where I was allowed one momento from the holiday and chose a glass tree with hanging ornaments on it, the colours were so vibrant and the fragility of it made me somewhat in awe of it all.  More recently, I have bought a couple of glass pictures, which I now know to be fused glass.

I'm terribly lucky to live near a wonderful teacher of glass fusing who is both able to lead you along but push you to be independent.  I confess that on my initial night I had no idea what it all entailed, had not really thought about it and felt like a writer presented with a white blank page that I could not fill.  Judith said to go with my gut and what inspired me.  The first thing that popped into my head?  Sailing, so a boat and sea scape it was to be.  Once I had an idea I cannot say that my work flowed but I didn't feel like a dumb wit as I had an idea to go with and was able to therefore be directed at least into which colours to use.  I first drew a rough outline of the sort of thing I wanted.  Again Judith encouraged me to go beyond cutting just straight lines even on my first session with her and explained how the sails on the boat would look so much better with a slight curve.  She was totally right but I was nervous of the cutting, however with her guidance, I managed it just fine.

Each week Judith teaches us something new and pushes us just that little bit more, below is small taste of the things I have been making in the past 8 weeks...

To make a bowl you need to:

Draw the circle shape on paper &
cut the glass to roughly the correct lengths
 



Then you need to trim each glass piece down to fit
inside the circular shape, this is not easy, well not for me!

After two firings, it should look like this!

Another larger bowl after it's first firing

Pendants are quick and fun to make

...as are rings, cuff links and brooches

Cufflink beads and wall hangings



The beginnings of a wall clock

A slightly different technique called
foiling, this glass will not be fired

So forgive me if I have been somewhat lacking in blogging these past few weeks, I'm still here but spending my time googling glass fusing, try it, you will see an assortment of goodies and then I think how I can make my own spin on these ideas and finally there is of course road trips to glass factories too...

Creative glass in Bristol

Such colours and so many goodies



No trip to Bristol in search of glass is
complete without visiting Bristol Blue Glass

♥  Loving creativity and inspiration,

what inspires you to be creative?  ♥