Fire and Glass...

For my birthday, Steve got me an amazing gift.  A three week glass blowing class at Agnes of Glass  in Denver.

My first week, I was pretty nervous leading up to the class.  My biggest fear, breathing in through blow-pipe, called the punty pipe, when I was supposed to blow out.  In hind-sight, I don't know quite how I could accomplish that mistake, but nonetheless, I was nervous.

Agnes, and her apprentice, Cody, are there through the entire process of gathering the crystal glass, marvering (rolling the hot glass on a steel table to shape it), blowing the piece out, shaping it with blocks and newspaper, and tapping it off of the pipe to put it in the oven to cool slowly.

I've been amazed at how much I've enjoyed this form of art.  I thought I would, and have always had a fascination with watching glass art, but there is something pretty amazing about making glass.

I'll share the first week's pieces, then as I get the others back, and photos taken, I will share those as well.

First, I got to make a paperweight.   I chose blues as the glass chips I wanted for the flower.  There were endless options, but these caught my eye right away.



We gathered the crystal, marvered it, put the color on, gathered again, shaped it with newspaper while rolling the tube on the bench, and then put a pick through the glass to make the flower.  Mine made this awesome bubble.





That same night I got to make this amazing meditation globe.



I went with similar colors without realizing it.  It's crazy how when the glass gets so hot, it all looks red, so I maybe should have tried a different color-scheme, but I love the way this one turned out too!

I blew the air into this globe, and then Agnes and Cody helped to get it much bigger and shape it.  I think unless you are a Master Glass Blower, you have help on your pieces.  And I'm glad they're there to help out!  When we put the "cookie" or base on the bottom, the glass can sometimes drip into the piece.  Mine did, and then came bubbling back up!  It was pretty dramatic.



I stamped a "D" on the bottom to show it was mine.



I'm just back from my last class, where I made another globe.  I'll take pictures of the little bowl I made the second week and just got back tonight when the sun comes up tomorrow.  For now...I'm off to dream of fire, and melted glass.