Glass!

Now it is time for me to talk about something I actually know about: Flameworking.
Glassblowing is usually though of as a large setup. You have the furnace, glory hole, oven. Its thought of a big brawny men with a hugle glob of glass working and blowing and creating. But I'm here to talk to you about another type of glass-working. Flameworking or lampworing is the art of using a torch to work glass rods and tubes and melt them, using different tools and techniques to work them.
Now in this technique is what is used to make different scientific apparatus along with different glass artworks like glass beads and models.

See, I can still find cute animals to decorate my posts....
they're just made of glass...
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Now usually I would take the time to show you how to make things, but today I'm going to tell you how I started flameworking, and why I love it so, and maybe, you'll decide to try it too.
The truth is I was stressed, I wanted to try working on something or taking a class that would allow me to relax. As you already know I love to create and make things and I had always been interested in making things out of glass, so I looked for a class in my university. Alas, they had no such thing, but they did have a glassblower. A few emails, days and maps of the department basement later I was learning the basics of glass.

Now chemical glassblowing is different from artistic. For one thing the most commonly used glass is borosilicate, the type of flame and heat used to work borosilicate is different that that of artistic. I learned boro first. Now borosilicate is better for science, it withstands the shock or rapid temperature changes that characterize some reactions. Soft glass is usually used for artistic glassblowing. It needs to be heated slowly and has a tendency to crack when put into too hot a flame, the reason it is used for artistic glass though, is that it has beautiful bright colours that you just cant achieve with borosilicate. I was taught to put special glasses to protect my eyes, hot to use the torch, turn it on, control the different types of flames and work the glass.

This is what my desk usuallly looks like...
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I started with simple pendants. I was taught how to melt a rod into a blob "It all starts with a blob" I was told. At the time I didn't realize how true this was. At first I went to have fun, look at how the glass melted; it was shiny and beautiful, it would melt and flow, glowing bright under my glasses. I wanted to see what I could do. At first it was just trying random things within the little I knew, but the more I went down there the more I became curious as to what the glassblower next to me was doing.  I began to ask and learn, first artistic, then scientific. Nothing specific, it was always how to make a seal, a flower, a giraffe. Slowly my curiosity evolved into something more, I began to look at the books my teacher had, I began to learn techniques, not so that I could try one thing, but with the purpose of putting them together, or making something more. After about a year of going in every chance I got I began to learn how to fix things. She had  so many things that were useless and broken. They were gifts of sorts, as labs moved out we were given their old glassware.

It was then that I began to realize that this was more than a hobby for me. As i learned how to fix simple cracks I learned to admire what my teacher did in a new light. I watched her fix things with this flow and ease that escaped me every time I tried to do the same. I began to practice fervently, trying to learn what I could, gathering the courage to ask her if I could help around the shop. I had jokingly suggested it before, but it wasn't until a series of events made my working there a possibility that I began to really work.
Now I am thinking about studying this as a profession. Of changing everything I had once thought to do because this art has enthralled me beyond my wildest imagination.