Have I ever said how much I love creating custom work? Well, if you don't know by now, I really, really love it!
A couple of weeks ago a customer contacted me via e-mail about creating some one-of-a-kind fused glass art for their living room. They had found me on-line and loved my work {their words!} and sent me a photograph of their living room along with some guidance on sizes and shapes for a bowl and eight coasters. Their beautiful living room {pictured below} featured bold colors and geometric shapes and after I had sent off a swatch of colors for approval, I set to work sketching some ideas. My first idea for the bowl was to create a circular pattern of abstract pieces, but quickly figured out that it would be difficult to get this design to come out perfectly. Yes, I am a bit of a perfectionist. I settled on a pattern of overlapping circles with a bit of abstract work on the edges for the bowl and a pattern of squares for the coasters. The squares would be the perfect partner for all the circles in the design of the bowl.
Cutting the glass for all the pieces took quite a bit of time since there were a lot of small circles and many little squares of glass in six different colors. The palette for this project was cobalt blue, aqua blue, orange, yellow, red and green. After cutting all the pieces of glass, it was time to assemble them into the design I had in mind. This design changes several times, but I finally settled on an arrangement of circles that was appealing. Assembling the square pieces for the coasters was by far an easier task. Once all of the pieces were assembled, they were placed into the kiln on a shelf and fired to a full fuse {1475 degrees} and when the pieces were fully cooled the large flat piece was placed back in the kiln to be slumped into a bowl mold. I chose the bowl mold with the wavy edge to add playfulness and chaos to its design.
The images below will take you all the way through the process from design to completion. Enjoy!
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| Color Swatch |
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| Bowl Base |
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| Cutting Circles |
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| Design |
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| Pretty Colors |
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| Repurposing a cupcake pan... |
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| Loading the Kiln |
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| Bowl in the Mold |
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| The finished set |
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| Primary colors, geometric pattern with a little abstract for good measure... |
