Leatherwood
Glass bead making
Jim is the glass bead master. A shot of him in action.
The glass is melted and formed around a stainless steel rod.
The molten ball of glass is pressed into the mold for a few seconds to form the bead.
Here is the bead as it comes out of the mold. The bead will need to be annealed in the kiln then Pat will take over and create a jewelry piece with this.
Back to Lampwork Beads
Glass bead moulding is a process used to make glass beads of a specific shape. The glass is melted and formed into various shapes by pressing the molten ball of glass into a form or mold. We start out by sculpting a pattern out of polymer clay. Once the design is captured in clay a mold must be made of this to produce a negative form that can be cast into metal. Once the bead has been molded it is then used to make a piece of jewelry.
Pat takes the clay and sculps the clay into the desired shape. This is then baked to set the shape.
A negative patern is then created using the polymer clay.
This piece will go to the foundry to be cast in alluminum.
see the foundry
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