This week, 10 of us met at the Murley Hall to learn the basics of stained glass. Under the tutelage of instructor Claire Albert, we each made a beautiful stained glass suncatcher!
Claire had us practice cutting on plain glass first, using a special cutting tool and snippers. We made straight cuts, then curved cuts and then tried to cut following a stencil.
Practicing cutting plain glass
Once we had mastered our cutting techniques, we selected coloured glass and cut shapes from stencils provided by Claire. Some of us went for sun, some stars and some abstract landscapes.
Ruth’s sunshine is looking beautiful
It was very tricky cutting the glass so that the pieces fit together perfectly, so we then used a grinder to help with shaping. After that, we wrapped the edges of our pieces of glass with copper tape before starting on the soldering – that’s the exciting bit! Using bits of solder, we joined our pieces together to get our finished products.
Liz works with her soldering iron
It was a fantastic day spent learning something completely new that none of us had ever tried before!
Our finished work
Click here to see more photos of the workshop.
Thanks to Claire for teaching us, and to Val for setting up the day and providing cake and biscuits!
