Messing around with Iridescent glass

I decided to make some decorative plates using iridescent glass.  I  built them directly in the casting ring on a broken piece of kiln shelf.  The shelf is just big enough to hold an 8 inch ring so it was easy for me to transport the entire rig to the kiln when I was done assembling the piece.  I don’t have a clamshell kiln so it’s a real pain (literally) to build something like this directly in the kiln.

I started off with a foundation of 3 mm transparent bull's-eye glass and then topped it off with a mixture of clear and transparent orange frit.  For this first piece I actually cut an 8 inch circle of glass and placed it on the bottom of the ring.  For subsequent pieces I used scrap glass for the bottom layer and used clear frit to make up the difference.  The first layer comes to about 9oz of glass. I then used about 3oz of colored frit and the remaining 6oz was the transparent red and iridescent glass. I carefully weighted all the components so I ended up with a little over 18 ounces of glass which will create a blank about 6mm thick.  So so first layer is the transparent glass, next the colored frit and finally the transparent red glass followed by the iridescent.

Here’s the shelf in place in the kiln.

All done!

I made another one using transparent blue and here’s one I did today using green.

Here’s the blue and red one with the edges ground and ready for a fire polish.

More on my art/stuff/piece/thingy…

 

This is how the beast is progressing.  I decided to fill in my “Tray” with multiple colors.  I first thought of just doing a single color (like red) like I did on the small votives I made.  I figured a little variety would be better since there since the iridescent glass pieces were spread further apart.

 

I cleaned the glass off using Isopropyl alcohol.

Here I bid fond farewell.

Here it is after the first firing. 

 

OK this is actually before the second firing; the first had some technical issues.  Apparently I did not have enough frit pushed to the edge so when the piece melted the glass base pulled away from the strips along the edge leaving several holes.  I filled them in with a little black frit and covered it with a little clear.  I’m debating on whether I should have needed to fill in the holes at all.  I’m inclined to thing a second firing without any fill would cause the glass to level out some more and close the holes.  Here it is after the second fusing and before the fire polish.

Ha.  Like it never even happened. I needed to etch the edges because the strips on the side acquired some devit.  The fire polish will clean it up.  It’s kinda sorta square…in the same sense you could call a cabbage patch doll “square”.  I suppose it could be called “organic”.  hmm…anyway I need to figure out how to mount the crazy thing. I need to frame it to put it on display for our art guild.  I’m thinking it might be easier to mount if I tack fused it to a piece of 3mm black and leave about a quarter inch edge around it so the frame has something to grab on to (nuts…dangling preposition…my wife is going to kill me).

Well, there’s more to think about. TTFN.

Blogger Labels: fuse,iridescent,piece,Tray,glass,Isopropyl,strips,edges,frit

A Donation…

Here are a few pieces Marcia and I are donating to a fundraiser for a local family that lost their house and all possessions in a fire. Marcia did the earrings.

Blogger Labels: Glass Fusing,Fuse,votive,Cabochon,Glass,Donation,fundraiser,earrings

A piece of work of…

…Art?

I liked how the Irids fired up in this votive blank,

I’ve decided to do a larger piece for the Lincoln Artists guild November show.  Here’s what I got so far.

Blogger Labels: art guild,iridescent,Glass,fuse

Oh yeah…

From this…

to this…

Oh yeah.

Blogger Labels: Fusing,Fuse,Votive,Plate,Glass

What to do with all this stuff…

A few weeks ago I spied an Ebay user selling 13 pounds of Iridescent scrap glass.  I first tried bidding on it (ended up losing) then I saw him selling a lot of it for 80 bucks.  Not wanting to pass up a good deal I took it.  It’s all dark irids and it looks insanely beautiful when fired up but now I’m trying to figure out what I’m going to do with all that glass. 

 

Well Here’s what I did.

I cut out a piece of black slightly smaller than the votive mold and then added a 6mm border around it to contain the frit I was going to add.  I weighed the centerpiece so I could add the proper volume and then added a layer of transparent clear frit on the bottom.

I then lay down the scraps of irid and started to add the orange frit.

Once I had all my orange frit in I used a brush to start to uncover the irid.  I don’t have any pics of that because I started to get pissed off.  There really wasn’t enough room to push the frit off the irid pieces without it spilling back on the irid.  I wanted clear and distinct boundaries between the Irid and the frit so I decided to pull the Irid out and lay it on top of the frit in hopes that the Irid would just naturally sink into the frit (remember the 6mm rule).

It is getting fired tonight so wee will see how this goes…

…to be continued…BOOM!