How to Make Blown Glass Pendants
Blown glass pendants are handcrafted pieces of jewelry that are worn as necklaces or used in more elaborate decorative designs. Pendants range in all kinds of sizes, colors and shapes, because there are no rules that govern how to create a piece. Whether you have access to a glassblowing center or if you have your own studio, you have the ability to create your own glass jewelry. By performing the basic procedure, learn how to begin making your own blown glass pendants.
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Things You'll Need
- Ventilation system
- Didymium safety glasses
- Torch with propane or MAPP gas and pressurized oxygen supply
- Colored rods: two or more different colors
- Tweezers
- Clear rods: 8 mm and 6 mm
- Graphite plate
- Graphite paddle
- Kiln
Instructions
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Turn on your ventilation, put on your didymium safety glasses and light your torch.
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Rotate a colored rod in the flame until it begins to glow orange. Pull the rod out of the flame, grab the tip of the glowing glass with tweezers, and slowly pull. This action creates a thinner glass rod (stringer), which you use to decorate your pendant. Repeat this process on any other colored glass that you want to use in your pendant design.
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Circle the end of the clear 8 mm rod in the flame of the torch. Meanwhile, rotate another colored rod in the back of the flame until it begins to glow orange. This color rod is going to be the main shade of your pendant.
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Stop circling the clear rod and hold it just underneath the flame. Touch the heated color rod to the clear glass and hold it directly in the fire. Begin to slowly rotate your clear rod so that the color automatically winds around the glass. Continue to wind your colored glass towards the end of the clear rod so that you have about an inch of colored glass.
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Rotate your newly colored glass in the flame of the torch until it all melts. There should be no obvious ridges or bumps when the glass is completely melted in.
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Heat your pendant in flame of the torch until it glows orange again. Remove the glass, position it on top of a graphite plate and press a graphite paddle into the glass to make the round pendant shape.
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Circle your pendant at the end of your flame to slightly warm it and simultaneously heat the tip of your stringer until it glows slightly. Hold your pendant underneath the fire and touch the tip of your stringer to the glass to make the design of your choice. For example, briefly touch the colored glass to the pendant to make dots, or drag the stringer across the pendant face to make wavy lines.
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Heat the pendant design until the lines display no obvious ridges and are smoothed over. You have the option to leave the stringer design raised or melt it in completely, depending on your preference.
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Heat the bottom of the pendant to a light glow and simultaneously warm the tip of a 6 mm rod until it glows orange. Pull both glass pieces out of the flame and touch them together. The 6 mm rod is now a handle (punty) to hold your pendant.
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Heat the top of the pendant until it glows orange. Pull the glass out of the flame and slowly stretch the glass up and around so that it forms a "C" shape. Burn off the original glass rod by holding it in the fire until it separates.
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Heat the top of the "C" shape in the back of the flame and when glowing slightly, use your tweezers to pull the "C" down so that it touches the pendant and closes the loop. Heat the area where the loop is now closed so that it melts in to create a secure hook. This creates a secure pendant opening to loop through a chain or rope.
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Heat your tweezers for two seconds in the back of the flame and then grasp the loop of your pendant. Holding your punty with one hand and the tweezers in the other, knock the punty rod on the top of your torch so that it separates from the bottom of the pendant. Lightly heat the bottom so that any punty marks disappear.
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Place your pendant in your kiln. Remove your finished pendant after a kiln cycle (usually eight hours).
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Tips & Warnings
If your colored rods begin to form bubbles, hold the glass further back in the flame. Some colors are more heat sensitive than others.
Never begin lampworking until you are set up with a proper ventilation system and understand the health and safety considerations. Always hold your glass over your workbench so that the glass does not accidentally fall into your lap.
References
Resources
- Photo Credit torchwork image by Jeffrey Sinnock from Fotolia.com
