Blog

I have written many times about COE (coefficient of expansion) and how never to mix COEs. But what about art glass.. Can you fuse that? Yes you can! It is not like tested glass where everything that is 96 COE can be fused together. You cannot fuse one piece of art glass to another piece of art glass. Well, what the heck can you do with it? You can take two pieces of art glass from the same sheet and fuse them together! I saw a project where a person took baroque glass.. Two pieces. Stacked them on top of one another in different directions and made plates. They were beautiful! I don’t have a picture of the plates.. but imagine two pieces of this blue baroque full fused and then slumped! You could also make a slumped vase, or a bowl. Another idea is to smash it up and use it in casting molds. This picture is from Elegant Fused Glass by Karen. The difficulty is you will have to figure out your firing schedule. You may have to coat it with Spray A to reduce devit.

One thing that I look forward to every year is Pantone announcing their Color of the Year. The color will then be seen in store displays, on fashion runways, all kinds of product designs, interior decorating, social media and I like to relate it to glass. I will be searching far and wide to bring you glass in this amazing color.

So far, I have found a Youghiogheny and it will be a stock number in January 2019. The number is 057 stipple

If you would like to read all about picking the color and about the color, go to www.pantone.com. This is from the site: “Pantone Living Coral emits the desired, familiar, and energizing aspects of color found in nature. In its glorious, yet unfortunately more elusive, display beneath the sea, the vivifying effervescent color mesmerizes the eye and mind. Lying at the center of our naturally vivid and chromatic ecosystem, Pantone Living Coral is evocative of how coral reefs provide shelter to a diverse kaleidoscope of color." Past colors of the year:

We are now seeing the spectrum numbers disappear from the offerings. They are being replaced with Oceanside numbers. The bulk of the Oceanside numbers will be fusible. There will be an amazing offering of fusible glass!

Here at Stained Glass Express, we are bringing in the Oceanside numbers as fast as they are available! It has certainly been a challenge. It involved moving all our glass around so there would be enough room for the fusible glass. We have continued to buy Spectrum numbers if they are available. The price is better and there is not always an Oceanside number to replace it currently. We are trying to keep as complete a stock as possible.

If you are wondering why Oceanside has moved to almost all fusible glass, here is their explanation:

• As a steward of the environment, this switch to almost all fusible glass drastically reduces our waste, and your waste too.
• The majority of artists “scrap glass” can now be repurposed in Fusing Projects, and our production glass scraps can be re-melted, making the glass more valuable to you and to us.
• At a high-level, this switch also offers us much needed simplification and efficiency in our overall production.

There are 2 main distinctions of the glass production - Hand-rolled (as previously provided by Uroboros) and Continuous Ribbon (as previously provided by Spectrum).

Some of the glass we have managed to get as fusible:

These are medium amber water glass, Blue Yonder, Sky Blue, Dk Blue w/White and Cherry Red Cathedral.

Great variety for fusers and, of course, these can be used for stained glass and mosaics!

The other day I was having a conversation with a glass artist about the difference between round rebar and flat rebar. Honesty, I have been in the business a long time, and I really did not know they had different purposes!

Then, I was at a concert that was an Elton John tribute band. It was at a venue in Madison, Maine called the Somerset Abby. A delightful couple rescued an old church and have turned it into a spot to hold events. It is a beautiful building. While everyone else was focused on the band, (and they were talented and entertaining) my brain was jumping around the room! There was a rose window above the band. It had both round and flat rebar. It was not lit. I decided at break to go out and get a picture from the outside, so it would be lit. As I was checking with the man at the door on my way out (so I could get back in) he told me to forget it because it was covered on the outside, but if I waited after the concert, he would turn the back-light on for me. I waited until the room was almost empty and then went back to him. He said “oh, the bitch is back” - I had to forgive him because that is what the shirt I was wearing said (remember it was an Elton John tribute!) He lit this beautiful window for me. Note the round and flat rebar.

Then I read several articles about rebar. I like the one by Vic Rothman. I don’t know who he is, but I want to give him credit for writing a clear and concise article which I have copied below.

Rebar 101

by Vic Rothman

There is a lot of debate about rebaring. I will attempt to clarify what rebar is and how it is used. The term rebar means different things to different people. The round (sometime square bars) you see in church windows are called saddle bars. The bars are set into holes drilled into the window sash (removable window frame) or window frames(non-removable). The windows have ties soldered to them at the solder joints. In olden days they used lead as ties, today it's copper wires. These ties are twisted around the saddle bars. The purpose of the saddle bars is to prevent the windows from being blown into the building, not support. At one time stained glass was a real window out in the weather. The ties should not be made very tight, but should be about one twist loose, thus the window can move in the wind. These bars are normally across the shortest distance. Next is flat rebar solder directly to the stained glass. These bars are sometimes drilled into the sash and frames, or just run full length of the stained glass and put under moldings. These rebars act like the saddle bars, but because they are soldered in place, they also prevent the window from deflecting near the bars. They will not hold up the windows. Now we have real rebar. This can be thin brass strips referred to as "fins", sizes range from 1/4" to 1" wide and about 1/32" thick. They are bent to conform to the lead or solder lines of the windows and are run in every direction. Last year I worked on a Tiffany window made about 1920 that was 4'x 9 1/2' (it took 5 people to move it) the back was a maze of fins and the window was perfectly flat. In copper foil window these fins can also go between the glass during construction. But as with any flat rebar the strength goes from the width not just the thickness of the metal. Thus a 1" wide bar is stronger than a 1/4" bar. Rebar traditionally goes on the inside, because you do not want rain, snow etc. getting on and corroding the bars if there were outside. If there is outside glazing, you can put the rebar on the rear. The placement of rebar is not rocket science. It is very logical. You put them perpendicular to a lead line that might fold. Parallel lines, glass borders, concentric circles etc. In large windows you may need rebar running through the center to prevent the window from flexing. Rebar is VERY design and window location dependent. The size of the window does not matter. You can have a 12"x12" window that needs rebar and a 3'x3' that does not. If you design the lead lines well, you need less rebar. As for seeing the rebar get over it. Rebar is part of stained-glass construction. If done right if should not detract from a good-looking window.

When doing jewelry or small pieces there are several ways to hang. What you don’t want to do is ruin the looks! One of the cleanest looks is a jewelry bail which is glued on when the piece is out of the kiln. Available in different sizes, shapes and finishes.

https://www.stainedglassexpress.com/?target=search&mode=search&substring=bails&including=all

There is also a form of a bail that has prongs to go into a hole that you have prepared in your glass. You do this by drilling the hole after the glass comes out of the kiln.

https://www.stainedglassexpress.com/sterling-silver-leaf-prong-pendant-bail.html

Another option is high temp wire. This can go right into the kiln. Put it between two pieces of glass so it fuses and becomes part of the piece. This is available by the roll or in little preformed hangers. This does not stay shiny silver when it is fused. It darkens.

https://www.stainedglassexpress.com/?target=search&mode=search&substring=3210&including=all

https://www.stainedglassexpress.com/high-temp-wire-24-gauge-10-ft.html

Handy Hangers are made of brass, so they can go into the kiln. Put them between two pieces of glass. The same folks who manufacturer handy hangers just came out with the Finley hanger which is more delicate than the handy hanger.

https://www.stainedglassexpress.com/finley-fusible-hangers.html

https://www.stainedglassexpress.com/?target=search&mode=search&substring=207158&including=all

The other option which is a different great look is to put fiber paper as a spacer. Fiber paper comes in different thicknesses or you can stack it.

https://www.stainedglassexpress.com/Fiber-Paper-1-8-in.html

I just read an article about an effort to compile the locations that have or did have Tiffany windows. It is a giant challenge but certainly a worthy one. http://www.cambridge2000.com/tiffany/index.html is the web site. It is very well done, and you can look up by city, date, designer, category, status etc. They also give a confidence rating which says how certain the piece is truly a Tiffany Studio piece. For example, Maine has 19 sites and 10 of those sites have something still there! How exciting. Two of those sites are in Augusta, Maine! The South Parish Congregational Church (which I have visited) has had 9 items, 8 of which are still there! (Can you tell how excited I am by the number of exclamation points I am using?) All these photos were taken by Wayne Boucher. These are all on the site that we share the link above. I encourage you to go to the site. My copied (with permission) pictures do not do them justice. If you go to the site you can click on them and they will enlarge. They are nothing short of breath taking! St. Mark’s Episcopal Church has one. This is not an active church and there is not a picture.

Paint pours are one of the most fun, exciting things to come along in our industry in a while. It is easy, and the results are amazing. Many people are doing this on canvas with acrylic paints, but in this industry we are going it on glass with enamel paints that can be fired. To do one of these projects you need: paints, layering mix, little cups, stir sticks, butane torch (optional), tray for catching the paint. https://www.stainedglassexpress.com/glass-paint-layering-mix-8-oz-.html https://www.stainedglassexpress.com/painting-markers/colors-for-earth-glass-enamels/ Some of the terminology you will hear are as follows: Dirty Pour. You pour/layer your paint in a cup and then set the glass on top of the cup and flip it over. Let the colors slide down and then lift the cup. So many variations. You can slide the cup around before picking it up or tilt it. After the cup is off you can blow with a straw or blow with the butane, drag something through it. You can also just kind of sling/dump the paint from the cup. Use more than one cup. Straight pour: Paint is poured/drizzled/dropped on the surface one at a time. Then you can use the variations above. Once the color is all over the surface you can wait a bit and then gently skin over the wet surface using an old credit card, palette, knife, fan brush etc. You can use the butane to bring up bubbles or pop air bubbles. Other fun things are to use a colander for pouring, or a sifter to sift dry powdered color on a wet base, a slotted spoon to create patterns, funnel to create pours. Let your imagination run wild!

Shoplifting becomes a topic of conversation often in a retail store. We think we have something in inventory because our computer data says we do, but when we are looking for it to fill a customer order we may find we do not have what we thought. Most times this is because someone stole it! Horrifying. I often say, it is even more annoying because “I don’t sell anything that anyone needs. They might want it, but they don’t need it”. Of course, I am referring to that they are not stealing milk to feed the baby back home, or toast so the little one can have a sandwich or toast. Even though not milk or bread, I have decided I will not say that anymore. The longer I am in the art world, the more I think people do need art to complete their lives, to help them cope, to express themselves, to help them heal, to engage with other creative beings and as many other reasons as there are people. Here are what some well-known folks have to say: “Variety of form and brilliancy of color in the object presented to patients are an actual means of recovery.” ~ Florence Nightingale “Art making has the ability to move people along their journey of grief and loss into a more balanced place of healing and hope. In the face of tragedy, the creative process can help re-calibrate a mourner’s life.” ~ The Chandler Gallery at Maud Morgan Arts “If art is to nourish the roots of our culture, society must set the artist free to follow his vision wherever it takes him… We must never forget that art is not a form of propaganda; it is a form of truth.” ~ John F. Kennedy The Emerald Green Healing Portal by Jaentra Green Gardener. Jaentra has a series title “Healing Arts”. To see more, click here: http://jaentragreengardener.com/gallery-of-stained-glass-windows/ I am convinced that art is needed but really does not need to be stolen!

Thank you to Bethlehem Burners for this Blog! If you landed here, you must be interested in buying your first lampworking torch! It’s an exciting time and you’ll want to feel confident in your purchase. In part one of our Lampworking Torch Buyer’s Guide, we’ll address concerns about buying a less expensive torch versus a more top of the line torch for beginner skills. They say: “Your first lampworking torch should be cheap and something you can destroy while learning.” Bethlehem Burner’s says: While this advice definitely has merit, a beginning lampworker should also keep in mind what type of torch they hope to use once they move past their “beginner’s torch.” For example, there are different style torches that produce different style flames. These different style flames affect the way glass reacts in the flame, which in turn affects the way the glass should be manipulated in the flame to produce the desired effect. Modern lampworking, using both soft and borosilicate glass, involves the use of a lot of color. Fuel mixture ratios and flame velocity affect the chemical composition of each glass color differently. This means flames produced by one torch will affect a glass color differently than the flames of another torch. If a lampworker learns to lampwork on one style of torch, they will need to adapt a lot of their glass techniques when they switch to a new torch style. This transition can be very difficult, time-consuming, and expensive. In order to make this transition as smooth as possible, it is best to choose a new torch that produces flames similar to the flames produced by the torch they learned on. So, while, “your first torch should be cheap and something you can destroy while learning,” isn’t necessarily wrong, it isn’t your only option. Kate Hayes, VP and resident torch expert at Bethlehem Burners weighs in on the topic: “Get a smaller version of your dream torch. Choose your first center fire style wisely, because the transition from premix center fire to surface mix center fire is the hardest and most expensive transition to make,” suggests Hayes. Stained Glass Express is a proud distributor for Bethlehem Burners. Click here to see the burners we have in stock. https://www.stainedglassexpress.com/flameworking_glassblowing/annealers-bench-burners-accessories/ We are always happen to order in other Bethlehem products for you.

There has been talk that the glass manufactured by Oceanside has more bubbles in it than when it was manufactured at Spectrum. In April, I was at the Glass and Bead Show in Vegas and the Retailer Association I belong to, met the representatives of Oceanside during the event. I sort of remembered that they said something about no buying the big furnace that was at Spectrum, so their continuous ribbon was different. I was wondering if that was causing the bubbles. I went back to my retailer group and asked what they remembered about the conversation. These are some of the answers I got. “It wouldn't be caused by annealing, just like fusing bubbles are trapped at higher temps. The annealing tunnels are just slowly lowering the temp, removing stress, and making the glass user friendly. Their glass used to be relatively bubble free. At some point, maybe in the late 90's or early 2000's because of the cost of natural gas, they converted part of the process (I may have these backwards, or wrong) to an oxygen/gas mixture. It caused one of the first significant brand wide price increases I remember. Base retail went from 4.25 to 5.95. I bet someone else remembers those details better. There was also a large amount of glass going to china, being made into lamps. It was said, that the glass was too perfect making people think they were purchasing a plastic lamp. Who knows if that was part of a decision, or in any way historically true.” I just re-watched the first 10 minutes of Vince’s presentation. He talks about them not buying the continuous furnace, that they are using a day tank. I think they are saying the day tank is now the continuous ribbon and that is different than hand rolled. “Tom Giles (rip) once told me KOG could eliminate almost all bubbles (& therefore surface pits) if he could hold the batch longer in the furnace (usually just a day longer). But he was not allowed to because of the expense of gas”. I guess we still don’t know why, but we do know there are more pits in the glass. In fusing this will not matter but it will in stained glass.

I guess it is obvious that our logo includes the Fibonacci spiral. Fibonacci was a person, an Italia mathematician in the late 11^th and 12^th century. In addition to other mathematical achievements, he is given credit for the Fibonacci Sequence. The Sequence is where each number is the sum of the two preceding numbers:

1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, 34 (and so on)

It may not seem obvious, but there is a strong connection between this sequence and artwork composition. If you look at our logo and visualize each square as a number that increases in size the same as the sequence you have the Fibonacci Spiral. (or our logo). Another connection is what is called the Golden Ratio or the Divine Ratio. Two quantities whose ratio is the same as the sum of the total to the larger ratio. (does your head hurt?) Just think of it as the Rule of Thirds. It is a way of balancing the composition of a picture. Nicer than just centering something. These pictures come from markmitchellpaintings.com

Manufacturing the World’s Finest Art Glass since 1976

We are pleased to announce that we are now the Northeast Distributors of Youghiogheny Glass. In the sales world there are generally end users, retailers, distributors and manufacturers. These lines have become more and more blurry as manufacturers sell to end users and distributors open retail stores. In April Youghiogheny asked if we would be willing to take this on. We will have more glass, more variety and better pricing. Our first large shipment will arrive in late September. Our sale for October will be Youghiogheny glass. Youghiogheny Glass is a small manufacturing company that specializes in the production of stained glass sheets and glass products for the art and stained glass industry. Its products are distributed world wide for use in the making of stained glass lamps, panels, windows and other arts and crafts. Youghiogheny Glass is world renowned in the artist community for it uncompromising quality and color artistry, designed to recreate the magnificence of nature’s palette. Youghiogheny manufacturers Stipple, High Strike, Tiffany Reproduction, Oceana and Y96. Stipple Glass has a waxy, ice-like effect that sets it apart. Due to the translucent quality of the glass, there is a 3D effect when colors are streaked together. This type of glass was first made by Tiffany Studios. High Strike is a mottled art glass. It is mostly one or two-color mixes and some are rippled or iridized. Tiffany Reproduction (rg). This a series of authentic Tiffany Reproduction Opalescent Glass. These three and four-color mixes use a specifically formulated opal base glass. This base creates a true white cast, surface hazing, and the waxy quality that is generally associated with glass made by Tiffany. Oceana. Oceana mottles are soft with a delicate wispy background. Each sheet contains varying degrees of density, which create a stringy dimensional quality that is uniquely Oceana. Y96. This is a line of 96 COE compatible glass. It has a robust palette of opal and cathedral colors. 1^st picture is stipple, 2^nd is Oceana, 3^rd is High Strike, 4^th is reproduction and 5^th is fusible. To see more: https://www.stainedglassexpress.com/Stained-Art-Glass/Youghiogheny-Glass/ https://www.stainedglassexpress.com/Fusible-Glass/96-COE/Youghiogheny-Y-96-Glass/