How to Round Out a Tube with Glassblowing

Skilled glassblowers are able to shape glass into almost any kind of vessel by rotating the blowpipe or swinging it. They use great control of the temperature while they work. Sometimes you'll want to close off and round out the end of a glass tube, a relatively easy technique.

Difficulty: Moderate

Instructions

1. Heat the glass tube so it's nice and pliable to work with. Every process in glassblowing has to be done with precision in order not to ruin the piece. Get it nice and hot so you can do this quickly.

2. Use a tweezers to take off a little bit of extra glass from the end of the tube. Just pull it out and twist until it comes off. Twisting the glass and pulling will bring the sides of the tube together almost to a rounded end by itself. Now all you have to do is smooth it out to a round shape.

3. Round the end with the tweezers first, then take either a small hand-sized marver, which is a flat steel paddle with a wooden handle that you can hold, or your wooden blocks and smooth the end out to the rounded end you want.

4. Blow into the tube to enlarge the beaker if you want, or you can leave it a thin size. Just don't overdo it and lose that nice rounded end. You can always add extra layers of glass to it to build strength.