Sept. 23rd - Unfinished Business

Shira's completed her Fleur De Lis Window and without a doubt, it's a hit. We've seen this pattern take off and be used before she has even managed to complete it so you know a lot of people saw that this was going to be a great design even when it was still in pieces on the table.


Suzie was in this week and now has her background tacked on to her window. Next week she'll add a border to her window and be all set for solder. It looks like we'll see this one finished shortly thereafter.

Patty came in with her pieces wrapped in copper foil and then tacked and soldered the 2 oil kaleidoscopes together. She only needs to insert the mirrors and solder the end pieces on to finish these. She also cut the glass for the stands and took that home with her so they're be ready for assembly next week just in time to take them all home.

Bonnie's been hard at work on her Fleur De Lis. Her husband Brian was also in class this week and brought along a stained glass guitar that he made at home. It's unfortunate that I didn't have my camera with me to get a picture of his first project because it was really something to be proud of. Bonnie appears to be a good teacher! These are an old look at some of the windows that Bonnie is working on. As I said, I didn't have a camera this week to actually show you what she completed. :-(

And there's a new Fleur De Lis in town! It's smaller and much more complex than the one that Bonnie, Shira and Myrt is making. Roxie decided that she'd make this FDL to go either along side of, or in between the letters UL. Right now we're leaning toward the side but we'll know for sure next week when we can move things around and position them to see what things will look like.

And that was all we had for this week. We'll have a small set of classes next time around and then be back to standard operating procedure here at the studio.

Paul
Bayou Salé GlassWorks

Unfortunate News

It is with great regret that I pass along this information. Although many of our students have not met Monique they are familiar with the window she had been making last month. No project makes it out the door without the other students watching and marking its progress on a week by week basis. This is the way most of our students came to know Monique.

Sadly, Monique's husband has passed away after only 46 years of being with us. Though his time was brief he leaves in his place a wonderful, loving family who will never forget all that Glenn brought into their lives. Of this, his family, he can be quite proud.

Monique, our thoughts and prayers are with you and your children.

Paul and Russ

Sept 16th - Mouse Attack!

Here we go-- Bonnie's first (of many) completed Fleur De Lis window. She has a lot more in the pipeline in various states of completion so expect to be seeing a lot of these. They look great though, don't they?

And Terry has wrapped up all the work on her window. This one will be mounted against the existing glass so there isn't any need for hooks. Terry moved along quickly and efficiently on this window and she's planning on making at least one or two more projects down the line. I can't wait to see what she does next.


Myrt completed both of her cabinet doors. It's hard to take a picture of windows that involve clear glass because you can't see the glass at all. In this case we're seeing through to the grey table top which doesn't really allow you to see what these look like.

Roxie (a.k.a. the Cross Lady) is at it again. Here's a nice red cross made with a 1.5" bevel center. These things look easy enough but when push comes to shove they're a pain to grind. If they aren't symmetrical any mistakes stick out like a sore thumb. That makes grinding a crucial element in the construction of these crosses.

Suzy was back to work on her Caduceus window. It's all wrapped and tacked so she was able to cut the background easily enough and then grind it all to fit pretty quickly. They'll be a border to add to this and then a quick soldering job will finish it up.

Here's Janice's frog all cut out and ground. A lot of it is even wrapped already. As you can plainly see she's cut the leaves down from the top and the bottom. This will created enough room for us to put her grandson's name below the window.

Jane worked on her newest lamp-- she got all 90 pieces of her top grid work cut and ground. There are still a lot of pieces left to go before she can start taking this together but mark my words, it will get done.

Grace has started her newest project-- a New Orleans street scene. There are a LOT of pieces in this one but they're all easy cuts. And the charm of this window is not in the straight lines, but rather the imperfect lines that make it up. A little section at a time will go a LONG way to getting this window finished and I know Grace can do it.

And lastly we have a quick look at one of Bonnie's unbordered FDL windows. She and her husband have been hard at work cutting out backgrounds, grinding them and then tacking them all together. We'll be seeing finished versions of these for weeks to come I suspect!
That about does it for this post. See you all soon,

Paul
Bayou Salé GlassWorks

Sept. 09 - Finished, Finished, Finished, Finished...

Wow, there are a LOT of completed projects this week. I was actually amazed when I saw how many there were in this post. So let's take a look and see what we have.

One of the big moments that everyone has been waiting for is to see Jane's latest lamp completed. And if you're reading this then you're in luck because this week we get to show it off. After making 3 of these lamps (or was it four?) Jane has decided to retire this pattern for a few months or more. She'll be making another lamp but her next one will have far more pieces than this one. You can't say she isn't adventurous!


Patty had her Sports De Lis window completed during her last class but it hadn't been washed or colored at that point in time. Now that it's cleaned up and ready to walk out the door we'll give you the full effect.

Not to be outdone, Grace finished up her Sports De Lis window on the same week. If it was a race to see who could complete their project faster I'd have to call this one a tie. There were very, very slight differences between the 2 patterns but nothing anyone would see unless they looked at the two of them under a magnifying glass. To make it harder to spot any differences I took one of the pictures from the back of the panel so we'd have mirror images rather than 2 of the exact same windows. Have fun trying to spot the differences (other than the obvious color changes).

Cheryl has completed her underwater scene and at almost 3 feet high it's a very impressive window. She's not sure what she'll be doing next but Christmas is almost upon us so gifts are probably going to become all the rage here in class. Maybe she needs to make some Oil Kaleidoscopes!

And speaking of Kaleidoscopes--We have not 1 but 2 (count 'em) Oil Scopes completed this week. Patty had decided to make one when she saw Roxie's 2 weeks ago. I'm positive that we'll be seeing more of these in Patty's future.


Suzy was another student to finish off an Oil Scope this week. All she had to do was insert the mirrors and then solder the end cap in place before she worked on the stand for this Scope. This is one of those projects absolutely needs a stand to finish it off. We make ours out of Glue Chip because it's cheap glass and it doesn't detract from the Kaleidoscope at all.

Here's a quick look inside Suzy's Oil-Scope. I took about 20 pictures but this was the only one that came out halfway decent. Regrettably, there's only a little color in this shot but trust me when I say that there's plenty to see when the scope is in action.

Now didn't I tell you that they'd be more Kaleidoscopes in Patty's future? She cut out these strips (a total of 14 pieces) just before she left class so she could take them home with her to wrap. Look for these to get assemble during Patty's next class.

Janice has started a new window and it doesn't involve Spectrum Tan or red glass. This Frog Window is for her grandson (Lakyn) and will match the one she did for her grand-daughter (Layla) back about 2 years ago. I realized after the fact that I didn't include the name "Lakyn" on the bottom of this one so I've readjusted the pattern and the change will show up in the next post. Luckily it was an easy fix.

Bonnie is now cutting backgrounds here in class and then wrapping like mad while she's at home. And she's a smart woman because now she's got her husband in on the act well. A family that does glass together.... Gee, I really don't know how to finish that one. At least I know it's not a bad thing! Look to see some of these windows completed real soon. (Note the #3 on her Fleur De Lis? That means that she has at least 3 sets of backgrounds cut out and ready for grinding.)

Meanwhile, Myrt has her coffee cup soldered together and set in the clear glass background. The only thing left to do on her Coffee Cup and the Coffee Pot panels is to solder them. And that means that we'll see these windows completed next week
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Terry isn't wasting any time either. Her geometric design has its background all cut, wrapped and is now ready for solder. That means that this is another window that will be completed next week as well. At this point in time you readers must think I'm a slave driver during the classes! (Well, I am! lol)

Everyone is moving really quickly and we have even more students lined up to start. Classes are really filling up quickly so check with us again soon to see what everyone starts next!

Paul
Bayou Salé GlassWorks

Sept. 02 - He's Climbin' In Your Windows!

Wellllllllll, obviously we have a finished window at Bayou Salé GlassWorks.

This is Michele's completed window and, yes, it's her first window. It took longer than 5 weeks to complete but not that much more and just look at this thing! The background gives this window a very traditional design and the Fleur De Lis make it say Louisiana in a subtle yet striking way.
Terry is almost all set here. All she needs to do is grind and wrap a few more pieces and then she can tack this together. Once that's done she'll cut the remaining 8 pieces that make up her background.


Myrt finished up her Coffee Pot and then cut, ground and wrapped her second center piece for her other cabinet door-- the Coffee Cup. The next step is to put these in clear glass and then solder them so we should be seeing these finished in no time now.

Jane's lamp is all tacked together. Not only is it tacked but the top half of it is soldered! When she came in she continued soldering and now there's only the bottom sections left to go. There's a slight problem with the cap which is about 1/16th of an inch too small to cover the opening on the top of the lamp in some sections. Rather than go with a much bigger cap that hides more of the glass we're going to wrap a wire around the bottom of the cap and solder the cap and the wire together seamlessly. No one will ever know that the wire is there and we won't see light coming out of the small gaps that are visible right now. It's a simple solution to a pesky problem.

Bonnie has been on a cutting and grinding frenzy here in class. I'm losing track of what she's been doing but I know her stack of Fleur De Lis windows is growing bigger and bigger each week. We're going to concentrate on getting some of these completed so she can get some money coming in rather than just shelling out money for these. :-)


And Patty's Sport's De Lis window is just about completed. She's soldering it now and she already has her mind set on making a few Oil Scope Kaleidoscopes after this. Aparently she really liked the one that Roxie completed last week. Look for the finished version of Patty's SDL window in our next post.

So you can run and tell that, homeboy!

Paul
Bayou Salé GlassWorks

August 26th - The End Is Not Near, It's Here!

Well, we've reached the day that Janice might at one time have thought would never come. She's completed all of her 14 windows and has walked out the door with the last one. We've already heard reports of people knowing where she lives because they've seen her windows on the 2nd floor of her house. It's kinda hard to pass without noticing --especially when it's dark outside and the lights are on in the house. I'm proud to say that Janice stuck it out and finished these because a lot of people would have stopped halfway through the project and said that only the front windows needed stained glass. Janice did them all and the results will now last her a lifetime.

Roxie came in on Thursday night and finished her Oil Kaleidoscope. I may be mistaken but I think this is the first time one of these have been made in class. All I know is that it's a big hit with the students as we'll be seeing many more of these in the weeks to come. Sadly, it doesn't look like much just sitting there on its stand but when you hold it up to the light and see it in action your eyeballs just about pop out of your head.

Here are 2 views of a look inside the scope. Imagine images like these continuously twisting and morphing into and out of each another like mini explosions of color-- That's what the Oil Scope is all about. And it's never the same view twice.


Terry came in to her second class with a pattern of her own design. This is going to fit directly into a window rather than be hung in front of it so the overall appearance is that of a built in look. This is Terry's first project and therefore it's her first time really doing this own her own and just look how far she's come in just three hours of class time! Impressive.

And Myrt isn't sitting around twiddling her thumbs either. She came in, explained what she wanted to do, and provided a drawing of what she had hoped to make. A few minutes later we had this drawing of a coffee pot for one of her two cabinet windows. The other window will feature a steaming cup of coffee. But that one is for next week. Also, we'll see a common thread in these windows to subtly link them together.

Bonnie has been cutting and cutting away but this week she spent a lot of time at the grinder fine tuning all of those pieces so that things fit together perfectly. She's taken all the glass that she ground home with her to wrap so that when she returns next week she'll be tacking them together and then cutting the background glass. She's not moving slowly at all- she's just making so many of these that I've honestly lost count of them all!

With her clear background cut and her border now firmly attached to her Sports De Lis Window Grace needs to just add a brass channel edge and then solder this window to finish it up. Soldering doesn't scare Grace (of course neither does any other part of making a window) so this will be out the door shortly.


It seems like I've been doing nothing but working on Blogs but I still have a way to go before we catch up. Almost all of the pictures have been sorted, adjusted, cropped and resized so hopefully I'll be up to 1 post a day soon.

Paul
Bayou Salé GlassWorks

August 19 - Who Made What?

I'll be the first to admit that it's been a while and I have no idea which butterfly is Terry's and which one is Myrt's anymore. I did know at the time but that was a few weeks ago and my mind isn't what it used to be. So here's my guess with a 50/50 shot of getting the owners correct.

So then, we had 2 new students join us this week and we all know the drill when that happens: A glass cutting lesson followed by a butterfly. This is the butterfly that Terry made (if she didn't make this one then it's Myrts) Nonetheless, Terry had no problems at all in her first class and I know she'll take to this easily.

Hopefully this is the butterfly that Myrt made. Like Terry, Myrt showed a natural ability to cut glass so these both turned out perfectly regardless of who made which one. Look for bigger and better things from Myrt and Terry in the weeks to come.


Identifying student projects doesn't get any easier with our next two projects. Both Suzy and Roxie decided to make Oil Wand Kaleidoscopes and they both decided to make them out of the same glass. So, once again, I have no clue which one belongs to whom. In the end I suppose it doesn't really matter since they're both identical. This is the one that Suzy is working on:

And the one below is (maybe?) the one that Roxie is making. All the hard work was completed on these during this class. All that's left to do is install the mirrors, cap off the end with 2 solder lines and then make stands for them. These aren't standard Kaleidoscopes because instead of a wheel that must be spun to see the effect, a clear tube filled with oil and glitter is mounted on the front of these. All you have to do is watch as the glitter slowly descends down the length of the tube in front of the mirrors to make the kaleidoscope effect. We'll get a look at still images of what it shows in our next post.

Janice is SO close to completion on her last window. The borders are attached and the front is soldered. That means that this will be completed next week (I know this for a fact) and Janice will be FREE of her year long project!

Grace has all of her Sports De Lis center together and has drawn out a pattern to cut the background glass. She's picked a nice unevenly textured clear that will give the window an old feel to it. This is coming out nicely.


Cheryl has attached the border to her window and I fixed the piece that I broke when I was was moving it to her car the other week (hey, what can I say, I'm only human). With everything soldered the only thing left to do is add the zinc channel to this and then wash it and color it.

Bonnie has been unbelievably busy making her Fleur De Lis windows. She has 4 more cut out this week: 2 in amber and 2 in purple. All four are stacked up on top of each other here but you get the general idea of how busy she's been! She'll be grinding some of these as well as cutting some more out next week.

Make sure you come back for our next post when we'll see a finished kaleidoscope and take one last look at Janice's final window.

Paul
Bayou Salé Glassworks

August 12th - A Liquid Gold Spill

We're on a roll now, 2 posts in 2 days and I have the pictures edited for another post and ready for uploading. Soon enough we'll be all caught up again!

Roxie completed her 2 LSU windows. When she first saw the pattern she thought it would be extremely easy but upon its execution she's decided that making all those straight lines line up is a b_tch! But as you can see she not only did it but she did it with precision and everything lines up beautifully.


Lisa finished soldering her windows and got as far as coloring one of them before she called it a night. Since it was dark out I took this first picture in the shop with a white backdrop. I told her That I'd color the last window for her during the week. All the real work was already done by Lisa-- all that was left was the cleanup. Here is her first window:

And I must confess that by washing and coloring Lisa's window the next day I had the privilege of taking a picture of it hanging in the window in the daylight. Now you can really get a good look at Lisa's window.

Suzie cut the scepter portion of her window and then spent time on the grinder making sure everything fit together. When that was over with she started wrapping her glass and even got the wings tacked together.

This is Patty's SDL window. Now that it has its background cut out I can easily tell the differenc between Patty's window and Graces.

And here we see Grace's Sports De lis window is all ground and mostly wrapped.About the only thing left for her to do are the antlers before we can cut out the background glass.

Jane has made MAJOR progress on her lamp today-- we got all the sections put together and then tacked on the cap so she can solder this one at home.

Janice is ready to attach her border. She got it all cut before the class ended so this means that she's officially cut the last piece of glass for this series of windows that she's making. It's been a long time but she's just about through with it now.
The front side of Michele's window is completed save for 3 small pieces of accent glass that she needs to place in the center stems. Once that's done and the zinc channel is added she'll be able to flip this over and finish it!
It comes to my attention that I may be missing a picture here or there during the ext few posts. Rest assured that no project will be completely forgotten but my mind is a bit of a blank while going through the weekly folders of pictures. And that explains the lack of detail in these posts. I just can't remember what happened!

Paul
Bayou Salé GlassWorks