Glass Fusing Sandblast Design

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Introduction To Glass Fusing
Glass Fusing Gather Materials
Glass Fusing Cut Glass
Glass Fusing Smooth And Decorate Glass
Fuse Glasses In A Kiln
Shape Fused Glass By Slumping In A Mold
Glass Fusing Sandblast Design

I love this step the most. You use sandblaster to take some glass off of your work to make it look rough, and it makes a contrast with the surrounding shiny surface . You first draw your design on this special sheet of paper. I forgot what it's called but it has a hard, sticky, transparent pane on a piece of white paper, and you cut out your design so that sandblasting doesn't affect glass outside of the design. Make sense?

I love to sandblast meaningful Chinese characters on a glass dish I made, and give it to someone as a gift. It is both practical and meaningful, and it is totally unique! Here is one.



This is actually a pretty simple piece. I didn't put any decorations on the glass. I simply cut a square from a sheet of clear glass, and then I smoothed the edges out, and then I slumped it. After it's done, I sandblasted my family name on it.

Here is one I made for my dad:



This is the most difficult piece I did. The white pieces you see have to be cut one by one, and each needs to be smoothed to perfection. The strips between them are made of transparent glass, and they also need to be cut and smoothed individually.

After I slumped it into the shape of a dish, I also sandblasted a beautiful Chinese character on it. Any idea what it means ? It is a character in my dad's name, and it also means all the good things in life!

Here is one I made for my mom:



This piece looks different in its design. I threw on little colored glass pieces before it went in the kiln for fusing. I also used glass sticks to make up a Chinese character, which is a character in my mom's name, and it means "leaf". I sandblasted the same character on the back.

Here is one I made for my friend. Its shape looks special, but I simply picked a mold of that shape to slump it with. The difficult part was to make sure the size of my dish was within a reasonable range so that slumping would be successful. Oh, and I arranged red glass pieces to create a Chinese character as well. This one I am not going to tell you what it means. If you really want to know, you'll find out because when there's a will, there's a way!



Glass fusing is very fun because you can make all kinds of design you want and you can make them practical. The only drawback is that you need several machines to finish your work, especially a glass smoother and a kiln. This alone makes it hard for me to make anything outside class. If I want to make a glass dish or plate for someone, I will definitely come back to class!

◀ Shape Fused Glass By Slumping In A Mold