A Short Week!

It was a quick week here at the shop as so many people are off on vacation. But we've still managed to get 2 projects finished. As you can see, Grace has wrapped up work on her cross window. Don't you love the little stamens in each flower petal? It really made a difference and only took about 5 minutes time to add.


Lea has yet another door completed and has started cutting out the centers of her 2 thinnest doors for next week.

Janice has only 16 triangles to tack into place (they're already cut and ground) before adding her final border. It looks like she'll be soldering this next week.

We got to see Ellen this week when we broke down and called her to help jump the car! She brought her lamp that she was working on along with her and then we all ended up at the shop where we tried different caps on her lamp and then attached the one she liked best. With only the soldering left to go she'll have this one finished in no time.

Cheryl wrapped almost all her pieces while she was at home. She finished the last of her pieces in class and then tacked it all together so we could make the circular patterns for the 2 borders of her window. After cutting them and grinding them she took them home for wrapping. Everyone seems to like this pattern and Grace thinks she'll be making it soon...

And that was about it for this week. There's still a lot going on that hasn't been worked on because of floods and Weddings and work schedules. We should be back in full swing soon. And Christmas is almost upon us so now is the time to get those Christmas projects started!

Paul
Bayou Salé GlassWorks

A Tiffany Reproduction

Jane has completed her Peony Lamp! Although she was concerned when she started this project she had no trouble with it at all. She wasn't happy with the soldering she did but I touched up the rough spots and that took less than 20 minutes. All in all I'd say it's a job well done. I only wish the camera could have captured the colors better in the picture here.


Not to be outdone, Sheila came in and started this window from scratch-- no pattern or anything. When she left at the end of class she took her finished window with her and it was even mounted in the door. Talk about a fast turn around!


Lea completed another of her cabinet inserts. We'll be seeing a lot of these in all sorts of shapes and sizes over the next few weeks.


Janice worked on tacking the center of her first 3 windows and the she cut the 42 diamond accents. After grinding and wrapping them we tried to figure out the best way to cut out the background. The glass wasn't tall enough to cut in one piece but we managed a workaround and got most of it cut in record time. This window is really shaping up.

Grace has all of her cross window cut ground and wrapped. It was a little tricky getting this together since the cross cuts into the border on the top and bottom of the window. That makes it much more difficult to make sure the window ends up square but it is. And it's ready for solder. This will be finished next week for sure.

Cheryl ground all the pieces of her angel window and is ready to wrap it. There are a lot ofpieces in those wings but she completed it all in one night. She's taken it home to wrap so look for even more progress next week.

The floor in the glass/office section of the shop is painted and looking better than ever. Work has resumed on our orders and we're back on track here. We'll see you tomorrow with another Blog post!

Paul
Bayou Salé GlassWorks

Little Shop Of Horrors

Fran's finished her latest Fleur De Lis window is completed and she hopes to be making some Mardi Gras masks next week. Frans soldering has come a long way since she started taking lessons. I didn't have to touch up anything at all on this.

Lea had tacked together a lot of bevels last week and this week she's begun to assemble the glass that surrounds them. Here you can see the 2 cabinet door inserts that she completed this week. since she has one door that is too narrow for a bevel to fit in it she simply filled it with a piece of her background glass. Talk about an easy window! :-)

Sheila has completed the last of her 4 cabinet door inserts! Next up for her is a larger door with a beveled center. We're not sure on the design yet but we have a basic idea in our heads. Come back next week and see what she's decided on.

Jane has her lamp all tacked together and we removed it from the mold. We help it up in the light and everyone agrees that it's beautiful. I won't show YOU what it looks like until it is completely finished and we can light it up in a darkened room for the full effect! Nonetheless, you can already see that it's incredible.

Grace cut all but the background of her window. After she ground everything she went to work on wrapping all her pieces. Now that the flowers have the copper foil on them you can see them against the pattern patter. She's going to add a clear textured background to this next week.

Cheryl came in and traced out the paper pattern to her Angel window. After cutting up the paper pieces she spent some time deciding on a color scheme which took a little while. But before she left she had almost all of this cut out! I think the only things left are the borders, the face and the hair. We'll see this being ground next week for sure. The biggest surprise we had this week was when Joey walked in the door and hung out with us. We don't get to see him much anymore and it was a pleasure to have him back in. Rocky Horror Picture Show, anyone? We've got to straighten out Cheryl's NetFlix list so she can watch the right movie! LOL

Janice finished grinding the last of her windows and as you can see it's stunning. She's got three of these all set to be tacked together and then she will begin on her background glass. You can see a similarity between this and Micheal's window (see the next picture) but you can also see how they are completely different in design. It's just the style that is similar.

Michael's window is shaping up now. She's begun grinding her pieces and she really only has the top section left to fit into place before she starts wrapping everything.


I believe that about covers it this week. We've painted the floors in the shop (LONG overdue) and the place looks so much better.

Paul
Bayou Salé GlassWorks

Classes Resumed This Week in 'Limited' Capacity

Well, we're back-- sort of. Although we had some issues finding a few things we did manage to have 6 students come in this week to resume their projects. We seem to have a lot of table top space but we're still hard pressed for places to store students projects since a lot of of storage was lost in the flood. Luckily we don't really have anyone working on anything large yet, so we're managing by piling things on top of one of the unused work tables. Hopefully we'll have shelves again by the time classes start filling up again and we need all the table tops for students. :-) We discovered that a few other things were missing but we were able to work around these small issues. All in all it made for an interesting set of classes.

Cheryl came in and finished off the two parrots (or are they cockatoos?) that she had started way back before classes were suspended. These are the same ones that Mary Lynn made and once again the black lead against the white glass really stands out nicely. Cheryl will be working on an Angel window next.


Fran was back in and resumed work on her Fleur De Lis Hexagon window. We'll see this one finished next week since the front is completely soldered.
Grace began working on a Cross and Bible window. I drew this up for Jane who made it while she was at home so I have yet to see this window completed yet. Although it's hard to tell, Grace has the flower petals cut out already. It's just hard to see them since the glass is white and blends into the pattern paper.

Jane got all of her pieces in place on the mold and I received acall from her just the other day telling me that she tacked it all together. When she comes in next week we'll show her how you balance it in your lap and put a final bead on everything. Doesn't this look GREAT! She used all art glass in this lamp and the results are certainly worth it. Jane was a little bit concerned when she started this project but she's already talking about making a second one!

Janice spend her class in front of the grinder working on getting her thrid window all fitted together and ready to wrap. She has one of these wrapped already and took the second one home with her to wrap during the week. This is a very classic design.

And last, but not least, we have a picture of all the bevels that Lea wrapped while she was here by herself on Wednesday night. After she finished wrapping them all she tacked them together so they'll be ready for their backgrounds over the next few weeks.


I have to say that it was great to see everyone this week. It's been a long time and I can't wait to see the faces that weren't able to attend this week.

Paul
Bayou Salé GlassWorks

Hurricanes Gustav and Ike

As you all knowknow we lost five trees during Hurricane Ike. All of them graciously fell in the correct directions and landed on other trees or the ground. Had the largest one fell the wrong direction it would have easily crushed the shop. The property was a mess but we considered ourselves extremely lucky and began cleaning up.

Less then a week later Hurricane Ike decided to hit us with 32 inches of water in the shop. Cleaning up has been slow because the shop wasn't able to be our first priority. It is now and things are starting to look a lot better. We emptied the glass rack, scrubbed it all down along with all the glass from the bottom 2 rows (that's a lot of scrubbing and repricing let me tell you) and have all the glass situated again.

It's been a long month and we're not finished but the tables are back in the work room and we're able to have classes again. We don't have everything completed and probably won't for a while, but we'll manage to help everyone get their projects finished.

Paul

Student Update

Although we have 3 sets of classes per week most of our students follow the progress of everyone else. They can't help but see the work that's being done in the classes even if they are not attending them. Because of this almost everyone knows each others names and projects even if they haven't actually met in person.

Because of this I think this posting should be made to inform everyone of two tragic events that have unfolded. First we learned that Gerald was injured at work and was suffering from 2nd and 3rd degree burns around his arms, chest and face. Although his injuries are indeed serious, he is in great spirits and we were lucky enough to see him recently. We're pleased to report that although he's a bit banged up and sore, he looks great and his recovery is progressing smoothly albeit slowly. We miss you Gerald and hope to see you back in classes soon.

And if that weren't enough we also got word that although Barbara survived Hurricane Gustav, just a few hours later she lost her house to a fire. Luckily both she and her husband were not home and both of them are safe.

Our prayers go out to both Gerald and Barbara as well as their families.

Paul
Bayou Salé GlassWorks

August 26, 2008

As you can see, Ann finished her window-- as expected. She's got a good handle on soldering now and in general she did much better than average. You can see in the picture that all her lines flow smoothly which is generally not the case in a first project. Ann plans on working on a sun window next.

Barbara completed her 3 door windows. The center panel was designed to match the two side panels but allow Barbara to see through her door to whoever is on the other side. They look great!

Jane spent a lot of time wrapping all the pieces that she has cut and ground. By the time she left class all of her glass was wrapped and ready to be placed on the mold.

Janice has the second of her 3 windows ground. She still needs to cut the backgrounds, but she'll do that after the center pieces are all tacked together. Janice has come a long way in a short span of time. And her work is flawless.

Lea wrapped 2 of her bevels and then cut, ground and tacked the background for one of her windows. All that's left for this is a border and she'll have one completed.

Sheila finished grinding, wrapping and tacking together the colored pieces of her last panel. There are only 5 pieces to go before this window is completed.


Paul
Bayou Salé GlassWorks

August 20, 2008

Sheila completed her third cabinet door insert and started to work on the colored pieces of her last window while she was in class this week. You can see that she's moving along faster and faster with each duplicate panel she makes. Look for her last panel soon!


Barbara is nearly completed with her three window. She finished the second window (which is a mirror image of the first one) and then began work on her center window. The third panel is much easier to do and she'll be finishing it while she's at home during the week. That means that we'll get the three of them completed in the next posting! Meanwhile, here's her second panel.


Ann got her final border wrapped and soldered into place on her window. AFter adding a brass channel to the edges she began putting a finished solder bead on the front of her window. By the time she moved on to the second side she had mastered the technique and was running a nice lead line over everything. There's no doubt in my mind that we'll see this window completed next week since she only has about half of the back side to do.


Jane began cutting and grinding a lot of her glass for her lamp and you can see some of it laid out in place on the pattern here. This is only one third of the pattern so you are only seeing a small portion of the pieces needed to complete this shade.

Paul
Bayou Salé GlassWorks

August 13, 2008

This is the first of THREE old posts that never got published. They're short and simple because there were only a few people in classes those three weeks but work was accomplished and we'll show it here in its correct chronological order.

We'll start with Gerald who made this cabinet door insert for his daughter while he was at home. While he was in class he worked on making the large paper pattern for the oval iris window that he is making for his mother and father's front door. We'll see more on that shortly.


I said this was a shot post but I'll bet you never thought there would only be 2 pictures in it. This is a picture of the Tiffany lamp that Jane is making a reproduction of. Her colors will be a little different from what you see below but the color scheme is shades of green just like in the pattern. This has always been my favorite lamp and I can't wait to see this project finished.


Paul
Bayou Salé GlassWorks