Tuesday, March 15, 2005

C'est Fini!

Well, it's finally finished! The window measures 19 3/8" x 68 3/4" and will be installed into my client's door next week. It took only a few minutes to design it, but took almost 3 months to complete. I would have finished it a few days earlier, but as I was cleaning it and turning it over to the reverse side, I broke 4 outside pieces! AHHHHHHHH!!!

After a really good cry with my neighbour and an email to my former instructor, and of course a trip to the glass store, I pulled the broken pieces out very, very carefully and replaced them with the new pieces. It's hard to convey in words how stressfull it was to do this. With lead came I could just cut the lead or evaporate it with my soldering iron, but with copper foil (which is stronger) you must not pull too hard because if you pull the foil off the surrounding pieces, you'll have to remove those and fix them, too. It's the domino effect in glass. It took 2 hours to replace those 4 1x12" pieces!

The glass is German New Antique (except the blue and cream which are Spectrum) done in copper foil with a zinc border for strength. I added a black patina to the solder to make it look older than it is. I am really pleased with the final product and my clients couldn't be happier.

3 comments:

K said...

Wow, that is amazing!

Anonymous said...

Deb- The window is beautiful. I'll have to keep my eyes open for a class in Seattle. I should probably wait until we have the first floor renovated, but we'll see...
I'm sure you're clients are very happy!

Scott in Washington said...

Wow, thats awesome! Now I have one more class I have to take before I die.