Making Gather With Glass for Glassblowing

"Hi! I’m Jim McKelvey with Third Degree Glass Factory in St. Louis. You can check us out on the web at www.stlglass.com. Today, we’re going to learn about glassblowing for expertvillage.com. Well now, it’s time to make the gather with real glass using a hot pipe. So, the first thing I’m going to do is put on some safety glasses. You should always wear safety glasses when you’re working around hot glass. Now, I’ve got a pipe, it’s the same pipe but it’s been heated. The tip of the pipe is a little bit too hot, and it may have a little bit of carbon on it, so I’m going to cap the back with my thumb so steam doesn’t escape, put that in water a little just to get some of that carbon off and cool it down just slightly. Now, remember the 7 steps to a perfect gather. Here we go. Open the furnace door enough so that you can get the pipe in. Rest the pipe on the sill and rotate it against the wall. While keeping the pipe turning, I go in and I look for the surface of the glass. I see the reflection. Now, I touch the glass down onto the surface of its reflection, and the glass starts gathering on. I got 2 revolutions, come up level, let the strand break off, put my left hand forward, come out of the furnace, and then hold the glass down to encourage it to fall off the end of the pipe and make a perfect first gather."