Blown Glass Platters

        

Blown Glass Platter Technique

These blown glass platters are created by painting a glass graal, which is a blown glass hollow egg which has an opening at the bottom of the egg. The graal is designed and painted with glass paint and allowed to dry. The painted graal is then placed in a kiln and heated to 540C in order prepare the piece for a heated blowpipe to securely attach itself to the opening at the bottom of the egg. With the piece attached to the blowpipe it is now removed from the kiln by a Gaffer (glass technician) and placed into a glory hole furnace to fuse the paint to the graal. A ‘gather’ is now performed which is encasing the entire graal with molten clear glass from the furnace of the glory hole. Then the entire piece is then encased in black glass powder, which will create a dark background to the glass painted design. The Gaffer then slowly blows into the pipe creating a larger form. Once the desired size is reached the top of the whole piece is then transferred to a punty rod which is a solid rod used specifically to transfer glass for another process. Once the punty rod is secured, the blowpipe attachment is chilled with tools and water and cracked off leaving the graal at the end of the punty rod. The graal now has an opening at the end where the blowpipe was and now it goes back into the glory hole to be heated to soften the edges. The piece is now spun into a shape using shaping tools by the gaffer to create bowls, vessels, or platters. When the form is complete the punty is chilled with water and the piece is cracked off and put into the annealing oven where it is cooled down to room temperature.