Instagram has a lot to answer for!
I saw a stripy glass dish on there ages ago and really wanted to have a go at making my own.
So when I was having a tidy in the studio and found some stringers (very thin 'strings' of glass) that someone had given me when I bought something else second hand from them, I decided to have a go.
It's quite a simple idea; take a clear glass circle. Lay lots of glass stringers across the circle. Fuse everything together. Lastly slump your glass circle in a mould.
I haven't done that much fusing and this is only my second go at slumping, but it all worked a treat!
And I leant some helpful lessons - yes you can use broken stringers to make a full line, but they will separate at the break. I think melting them together first would stop this happening.
I also found out that cutting a big circle is quite hard. I didn't have anything quite the right shape to draw round, so it's not quite a proper circle. I do have a circle cutter, but it max's out at maybe 10cm. So if I want to do more I either need to buy a circle cutter that will do bigger circles, or buy pre cut circles!
I also amended my firing schedule as it was set for a 6mm thickness of glass and mine is more like 4mm. Reducing the time it sat at the top temperature seemed to work fine.
So now I have a lovely stripy dish. I love it, and I love how it changes in different lights. Love when a glass project works out first time!
