Do You Have Rainbows in Your Halos?

Left ~ 960º...Right ~ 900º Anneal Soak Temps

If so, that’s not a good thing.  Halos are stress in kilnformed glass when viewed through polarizing film & if your halos have rainbows you have a lot of stress ~ meaning the glass is likely to break!  I just opened my kiln with the first load of cast glasswork (in commercial molds) using the new annealing temperature announced by Bullseye during BeCon, the glass conference I attended last week.  For my entire kilnforming career I’ve used 960º as the anneal soak, as taught by Lani McGregor at my very first glass fusing class at Bullseye many moons ago.  The new anneal soak temperature, 900º is closer to the strain point  which equals less risk and a more efficient anneal cool.  Ideally, you have multiple thermocouples in your kiln to check temps at critical points in relation to the glass, but I don’t want to get too technical here…

I couldn’t wait to check the results using a polarizing filter comparing the new & old temperatures.  Monday evening I loaded my kiln with a few Colour de Verre boxes filled with frit and powdered glass.  To have an exact replica of a box I’d already made for my test, I used Erbium pink course frit in the kidney shaped box.  Today, Wednesday, I pulled out the lid and placed it between sheets of polarizing film alongside my very first Erbium pink lid.  Please note the irregular edge of that first lid ~ it’s to show you how imperfect I am!  As careful as I’ve been with my film, I notice all the scratches on it, however I want you to focus on the glass atop the film.

So looking at the top photo, the lid on the left, my very first, and comparing it to the lid on the right from this morning you notice three times as many halos or whitish spots on the left!  I will be readjusting ALL my firing schedules!!  All the glasswork annealed properly at 960º is still good, durable, and safe from breakage, but as you can see, 900º is better.  For me as an artist, and for you as a patron of my work, a student learning from me, or an associate with whom I trade information 900º is the anneal soak temperature to use!  If interested, you can view Bullseye‘s new annealing chart for thick slabs here.

Blue Oval 960º : Aqua square 900º

For a little color I also checked a couple boxes of differing colors, then wanted to compare the same shape box.  Interesting, yes?

Aqua 900º : Red 960º

New Boxes are in!

Red Yellow Blue

As promised here are the boxes that were finished, just in time for the Columbia Gorge Art Festival. I had to re-make the lids – the first time through I overfired them, making the embellishments too flat.  The frog lid was especially sad as a flattened embellishment.

Princely Green

When I teach at D&L Art Glass in Denver this July, I’ll be leading students through the process of making these wonderful boxes using powdered glass for color.  New ideas abound as I fill the Lidded Box Molds again, making the next round of boxes.

I’ll show the next round soon, but must first spend some time filling up my on-line shop and firing more glass for the upcoming Art in the Garden show!

Did you see me?

Columbia Gorge Art Festival '09

…at the 11th Annual Columbia Gorge Art Festival?  My display was a rainbow of color!  I had a huge collection of Celestials.  Wallpockets.  Glass inlaid wooden boxes.  Vessels for your flowers.  New cast glass boxes (more photos to come!).    This week will be spent stocking my on-line store with beautiful sparkly glass, as this was my last show of the season so I won’t be working quite so ‘full steam’ in the studio.

The festival is a yearly fundraiser for the Corbett Education Foundation (http://www.corbetteducationfoundation.org).  If you missed it this year, be sure to watch for it next year!  Overseen by Pam, an energetic woman and co-owner of Natural Spaces, she has a wonderful crew of volunteers, including Donna, Dee, Sue and so many others who make the artists not only feel welcome, but well taken care of.  They help us load in, help us sell & watch for us if we’re not there.  They feed us, bring us sweet treats if we need an afternoon pick up, BUY FROM US (!), then when it’s over help us load out.  I’m usually the last to leave, so the other artists might not know that after the close of the show, they also put the school back together with the aid of digital photos, exactly how they found it!  They vacuum, they put the children’s artwork back up on the walls, they carry out bags and bags of trash.  Kudos to them one and all!

My neighbor this year, Laurie Miller had a wonderful colorful display of her work that you can see at: http://lauriemillerdesigns.blogspot.com.  I have one of her fabulous boxes that I keep special jewelry findings in.

My friend Cindy Cossu at: http://mysite.verizon.net/res83mar/ always has wonderful new work there.  She’s and I have exchanged artwork over the years so I have a nice collection of her work.

I chose to do some very early Christmas shopping (doing my part to stimulate the economy!) and purchased well over the average I was told!  Some of the treasures I found were decorative paper boxes with working drawers by Mike Smith.  Um….I guess since my family might read this I’d better not go into too much detail, but for the children in my life, I found wonderful Fairy Chairs by David Palomino (http://davidpalomino.com/)  and Fairy baskets by his wife, Nancy (http://nancypalomino.com/).  Some of the other artists I purchased from:  Judee Moonbeam, Marguerite Perry, Linda Rydman, Jeanie Stein, Krista Weber, Kris Zorko.  One of my favorite artists there is Melissa Gannon, and even though I wasn’t able to purchase from her this time, I want you to see the incredible work she does: http://melissagannon.com.  As soon as I learn how to insert hyperlinks, I’ll edit so you can click on their names to see their work!  For now you’ll have to see them the old fashioned way by ‘Googling’.

Thanks again to Pam & crew for another wonderful show.  See you next year!

Back to Boxes

 

Cast Glass Box with Lid

My shipment of new box molds should be arriving any day now. I have the kidney shape that Craig at Colour de Verre (http://www.colourdeverre.com/index.php?cat=4) gave me and I’ve made a couple of them.  The box pictured here is a pink so dark that it almost appears black.  The lid embellishment is CdV’s Lotus Flower mold.  I have a new box in the kiln using clear frit with purple powder which will give it a ‘veined’ appearance & can’t wait to see how it turns out.  

I LOVE these lidded glass boxes!  I’ve tried making various glass boxes in my kiln to no avail for years, so am excited and happy to find a reusable casting mold that works.  The other shapes are round, elliptical, and rectangle.  The lids can be embellished with a cast accent, using another CdV mold or my own original mold, then tack fusing it to the lid.  

Frit Cast Glass Box with Embellished Lid

Don’t forget the auction in my previous post!  You have until this Friday, May 8th at midnight to bid on the puzzle vase.  I’m so thrilled with the response at this point that I’m throwing in an extra surprise for the lucky high bidding winner as a thank you!