My sustainability project.

  I have finished my uni piece for my 'Sustainability' assignment.

Due to the fact the working with glass isn't one of the most sustainable art forms, I decided to create a piece that might draw attention to the plight of the planet instead.  

I also decided that I would not purchase anything to create this piece, but concentrated on working with things I already had.

In my head I wanted to make a clock, to draw attention to the fact that we have limited time left to help the planet.

I had a box of mini wine bottles that I scrubbed and dried, then popped in the kiln to melt down flat.

My kiln is quite an energy efficient one, as it's not soo big, but I did need to do a couple of firings to complete my piece.

Once they were flat I messed about for a bit trying to decide on a formation. Ideally I would have liked to use all twelve bottles, but this was going to make the clock too heavy to hang.  In the end I decided on a formation of eight bottles, leaving some to use in another project at a later date.

I cut the numbers out of old copper sheet that I had rescued from a fire pit.

Once that was all nicely fused I was just going to fit a clock part, when I came across a clock kit in my stash that had an interesting wooden ring. Immediately I thought this would be excellent as a 'warning' ring if painted red.  Warning road signs are usually red rings.  

Because there was also another piece of round wood in the kit, I could sandwich the glass in-between the pieces with glass glue and bolts - therefore making it a much sturdier piece to hang on the wall.

As I now had a red warning ring I felt like I needed a warning statement to go on it.  My daughter helped me out with that - I wanted both the words 'Time' and 'Waste' within it.  She she wrote... "Don't call time on the Earth, reuse, don't waste". That worked really well so I wrote it on.

I was VERY unhappy with this as my handwriting is appallingly bad.  So it was back to the drawing board for that.

After a quick repaint, I dug out my vinyl cutting machine and I had some scraps of black vinyl left that had come from my old shop many years ago.  I cut out the words by machine this time and it looked so much better.  Using the vinyl was something I wanted to avoid if possible, due to it being plastic.  If it wasn't lockdown and I could have found someone with nice handwriting I would have definitely done it that way instead.

Now it was time to put it all together and add the clock mechanism.

And my piece was finished.  And it holds it's own weight well on the wall... and you can tell the time so it's functional too, as well as being a conversation starter,

I have enjoyed this project. I particularly like working with materials that might have otherwise gone in the bin.  Giving something a repurpose is something I try to do in other aspects of my life, like adapting clothing and sprucing up furniture.  So this assignment was right up my street.

Thanking the Kiln Gods.

  The Kiln Gods were good to me overnight, when I opened the lid of 'big blue' my faithful kiln I was so relieved to see a piece that had worked how I wanted it to.  Always a risky business using recycled glass.

It had slumped down pretty evenly and the numbers had worked.  Big thumbs up all round.

So, off I went to my craft shed to find a clock mechanism that I know I have somewhere as I save all sorts of stuff for 'just-in-case'.

Instead of just finding a mechanism, I actually found a clock kit that someone had gifted me a few years back... now my idea had evolved somewhat, I could use this piece to add something else to the design.

The kit consisted of a wooden clock base, along with a wooden ring and the clock part.

I decided that the ring needed to be bright red... like a warning ring, to warm people about time ticking away to save our planet.

So I painted it all red.

I am going to give it another couple of coats, then work out how to assemble it all!

Deciding on a layout for my clock.

  Sometimes I have a determined plan in my head about where a design should end up, and other times  (most others) I just see how the pieces fit together and how much I like the look.

Not just with glass, but also with quilting and crochet, I will lay out a design, take a photo, move it around, take a photo...numerous times.  Then I go and make a cup of tea and flick through the photos, finally choosing a design/layout that way.

You seem to get a different view through a camera, you can certainly spot flaws and mistakes more in a photograph I think.

So I laid my bottles out in the kiln...

Then I decided that I really did need numbers, at least on some of them.

Using some old copper sheet that I had rescued from a fire pit, hence the beautiful colours on it, and cut it up.

I decided on Roman Numerals as it would be much easier to cut straight lines of copper sheets, rather than cut around shaped numbers.

I don't know where my head was when I did this, as I cut enough pieces to make up numbers 1, 3, 6 and 9, it wasn't until I was placing them that I realised I need a 12 instead of a 1.  thank goodness I caught that in time!

So, back to the kiln and laying out a design.

I finally settled on the middle design, it was a difficult decision which I pondered over for sometime.

The bottom design used all 12 bottles, which equated to the 12 numbers on a clock, but it just seemed a little bulky, plus I thought if I halved the use of the green bottles it would leave enough for another art piece in the future perhaps,

The kiln lid is now tightly shut and heating up nicely to fuse all the pieces together.   Fingers crossed!

Experimenting with what I have....

  Because I cannot really totally sustainably make a piece of glass art, I am going to head down the route of making a piece that will raise awareness.   I am also only going to use things that I already have. I am determined not to purchase anything extra but work around design issues to find a solution.

I have decided to make a clock - to show that time is ticking away for the planet and that we, as consumers, need to act now to help keep it safe.

The clock will be made out of the mini wine bottles, I have a clock part in my box of oddments that I can use.... the design will come to me as I put it together.  I have a rough idea of a design, but sometimes when working with glass - especially recycled glass, you have to roll with the punches and change the design at the drop of a hat.

I thought I might like to put some numbers on the clock, so while the kiln was on and melting the wine bottles flat, I added some little pieces of broken bottle to the corner with different things added to try and see if I could make marks.

The results weren't as pleasing as I had hoped, The Reichenbach green wasn't too bad but I would have  need a good thick layer before it looked decent, and the thicker I had it the more chance there would be of it cracking as the two glass types weren't compatible.

The mica powder just brushed right off, off the top fired piece and the piece with it underneath, which I found surprising.

The silver luster was very disappointing, I expected it to turn a nice dark metallic silver and it did ... nothing!

So that left the copper sheet piece. Now I know that copper sheet works well when sandwiched between two layers of glass, but didn't actually think it would adhere when just placed underneath - so this was a pleasant surprise.

Hopefully, I have found the way now to add numbers to my clock.  Happy days!

Messing about with wine bottles.

 I seem to manage to collect all sorts of glass  - glass fascinates me and if I see a nice coloured bottle or an interesting shape I can never bring myself to put it in the recycling.   Because of this habit I have amassed quite a collection.

Some I make into pretty lamps, others I melt and make abstract shapes from.

For my sustainability assignment I have decided to try and make a clock out of mini wine bottles. 

I had a box of these mini Mateus Rose bottles, just because they are such a pleasing shape, so thought it was a good time to make them into something new.

So, time for a good scrub.  It took a pan scourer and a teaspoon to scrape all the lables off, and I had to cut off the little wire ring around the neck. Neither of these would have been good in the kiln.

When they were all nice and clean I put the bottles in the kitchen oven to make sure they well and truly dried out.   My kiln is a glass kiln which wouldn't take too kindly to the presence of moisture within it.

I laid them all out, making sure none of them were touching, then programmed the kiln to do an overnight fusing fire.

In the morning I opened the kiln lid to find a set of lovely flat little bottles.  Result!

As my kiln isn't a large one I needed to do two firings to get enough bottles for my piece.  So now another patient wait until tomorrow when the next lot will be ready   :)