Violet Noise
30 March 2025
I: The Bubble Mold
Working with Sometimes on the fourth Sunday morning of the spring workshop, I was back to being myself.
The vase I made from All The Glass' basement shards didn't come out as well-formed as the previous one. The colors were better though. Making these vases is tricky. The shards are on the outside. Each color wants to go its own way.
I learned to cut off the end of the glass after I go into the bubble mold. The bottom of the mold is flat. By removing the flat part, the bubbles go all the way to the bottom. The cut section looks like a squashed marble. I've been putting those in the annealer to be picked up later.
There was nothing to lose by using these scraps. I got a semi-decent cup out of it. The black streaks in the off-batch gold ruby are starting to bother me though.
Maybe an LED tea light could come to the rescue.
I cut off the bottom of the hyacinth blue frit gather to make another bubble mold drinking glass. These bubbles didn't stretch much. I still have a lot to learn with this mold.
They didn't stretch for the aqua metallic frit either.
Towards the end of the morning, CP asked me if Sean and Dale would be coming back to watch us this semester. I asked Murano and Sometimes if it was okay, and they said yes. Immediately, I texted Dale. She said yes.
A few hours later, I texted her again. "Give me a color and a verb."
The next night, I did battle with blue aventurine in the bubble mold. Last year, I'd used the bed of nails and made a lopsided hat-bowl with blue aventurine. It had been in the display cabinet until I did a small purge over winter break. I figured I could do better.
The first piece was supposed to be a bowl, but I lost control of it. I spun it out into a teardrop-shaped plate. We put it in the annealer anyway. I figured there was a good chance I'd toss it as soon as it came out, but one never really knows until then. When it did come out, it was clear that the bottom would need a lot of grinding to set it straight. I ended up taking it home and bringing it back to polish the bottom so that the color and bubbles would show through. I could have spent more time getting the bottom to a full shine, but I lost interest. After all that work, the plate went into the reject/student sale box.
I was determined to do better. My next attempt was a semi-straight bowl that I spent far too much time on and kept in the glory hole too long. The bottom cracked when I broke it off the punty.
Forget all the other colors I'd poured out and the two rods in the little oven. I was going to make something decent with blue aventurine and the bubble mold if it took me the rest of the semester.
"I think this one wants to be a vase," I told GGP.
There were three good sides and one bad side.
I did get a chance to use one of the rods. It was getting late. The slice was larger than I ended up needing. I could have blown the glass out more. Instead, I wound up with a tall, heavy vessel that is too big to drink from. The bubbles worked though.
Later, I put an LED tea light in it.
II: Color, Verb
Dale texted back, "Cerulean drift."
I emailed and texted a handful of friends to send me a color and a verb. That's when I found out how many of them do not know what a verb is. Also, the best responses came from two of my friends who are aphantastic.
I made a list of the ones I could see or come close to seeing (because I'm hyperphantastic):
cerulean driftviolet noise (not a verb, but I like it anyway)moss green creepchartreuse punchazure leapmaroon swaycelestite swoopamber spinvemillion reach (I came up with this one)green distraction (not a verb, but "distract" is clunky)purple unmaskblueberry gobble
With Daylight Savings Time about to begin, I knew I'd be off my game on Sunday. I decided to figure out a few of the color verbs ahead of time by pulling out the frit I'd need and putting them in labeled bags with little drawings. I set aside colors for cerulean drift, violet noise, and vermillion reach.
I got to class feeling as if I'd had either too much caffeine or not enough. I'd led a hilly, windy bike ride the day before too. "My body is two beats behind my brain," I warned Sometimes. She'd had a physically demanding Saturday as well.
Murano was setting up at his bench. He gestured between me and CP. "Where are you working?"
I pointed to the other bench and looked at CP, who was closer to me than Murano was. "He's all yours," I said.
Last year, I had a rod of cerulean blue. I used it up. Murano thought he had some, but it turned out to be copper blue. He offered some to me. I poured a little into one of the scoops, and went into the cerulean drift bag for the other colors.
The first doodle was the simplest: a copper blue background with dips into iris dark blue frit and reduction by torch at the end.
I texted Dale to tell her that Cerulean Drift #1 was in the annealer. She texted back that they'd be on their way soon.
Sometimes made a couple of one-gather stemless wine glasses to warm up.
I launched into Cerulean Drift #2: capri blue on the first gather, a thread of metallic cobalt on the second gather, and then some random swipes with a little garden rake All The Glass had brought in last Monday. That's when Sean and Dale came in. They watched me pull the glass into a long-neck vase. I hit it with the little torch before we put it away, but I couldn't tell if the blue was reducing. It wasn't easy to see what was going on while the glass was hot.
The result was a color treat.
In the bright light of the hotshop, I didn't see any reduction. When I put the vase on the Window Sill of Judgment at night, the metallic sheen showed.
Cerulean Drift #3 was the easiest to make, with a cobalt core and a roll in purple rose frit. I used the rake a little, but not enough to make a difference. The top was going wonky on me, so I hung and spun it the way Sometimes does with her vases. That evened things out. The pink is too chunky for my taste.
This must be where I raked it:
We went to Philadelphia that night to have dinner with a college friend who had moved back to the United States. I greeted him with, "You picked a great time to come back." He shook his head. "England is going down the tubes." I gave him the black and white square mold vase with the curvy top that I'd made with Murano on February 27.
III: Return of the Bubble Mold
I was still out of it the next day, trying my best not to screw everything up at work. "It's just an hour," I griped.
"I'm a mess today," I warned GGP. She smiled. "Just don't burn me," she said.
The first thing I tried was something I'd seen as I was falling asleep the night before. Between two of the cast-off bubble mold marbles, I added a slice of silver clear rod. I'd bought the rod thinking it would live up to its name under a torch, but it never did in my hands. Here, I'd use it as a layer of clear between the two colors.
I'd never picked up three rods in succession. I asked Sage how far in I should blow the starter bubble. Of course she had the answer. "Our Instructor used to pick up three rods all the time," she said. Thanks to her direction, I made a drinking glass that I really like. It bumped the purple bubble mold glass out of the kitchen and onto the shelf with the saffron one. It would serve as my regular drinking glass until something else would bump it to the display cabinet.
This is the third one I've done. I like the variety of colors, but of the three, the one with fewer shards turned out the best. I have enough shards to try at least one more.
I had a container full of bubble mold cut-offs and half a rod of silver clear. I'd try again.
GGP picked up some shards she'd gotten from All The Glass' basement. She had the same trouble I did: the colors wanted to go in different directions. We beat it back into shape. When my turn came, I laid out on the hotplate even more than she had, with bigger chunks closer together. I gave it more time to heat, but the pieces still cracked and jumped off the plate when I tried to pick them up with a hot gather. GGP rescued a sliver of yellow that had landed on the floor so that I could go back for it.
The bubble blew out oblong. I fought and fought it, using the wet newspaper like a glove to force the bubble back to round. It almost worked. I know it's not perfectly round, but it's not immediately obvious.
This is the third one I've done. I like the variety of colors, but of the three, the one with fewer shards turned out the best. I have enough shards to try at least one more.
GGP asked me to show her how to make a long-neck vase. "Yours is a million times better than my first one was," I told her. I don't have my first ones. They were made with clear glass, and one of the two beginners that semester took them, neither willing to admit the pieces weren't theirs. All I have are photos from the annealer.
Next, I went back to the bubble mold and the blue aventurine frit. "I'm gonna get this damn color to work!" I snarled.
I flubbed the cutoff, so there weren't any bubbles at the bottom of the drinking glass I was almost finished making. I was at the glory hole and turned back to the bench in time to see Rose there, fishing for her unfinished vase that had leaped off her punty and rolled under the bench. I turned back to the glory hole. The cup fell to the floor, the molten top crumpled. I tossed it.
GGP made a quick pumpkin mold bowl. There were 25 minutes left. I tried again. Rushing through a piece rarely works for me. This time, it pretty much did. Maybe speed is the secret to the mold. Stay hot; don't dick around.
The top isn't completely flat, and the sides could be straighter. But it's a drinking glass all the same.
I decided that next week I'll try again with gold aventurine.
Meanwhile, it was time for some violet noise.
III: Color, Verb
When Sunday came around, Sometimes and I tackled iris purple on enamel white. I hadn't even transferred the piece to the punty when the white began to reduce to a brownish-gold in a thick band through the middle. I've seen this happen when I've held a torch to it, but never when I'm not even halfway through working with it.
When I was finished, I took a torch to the iris purple, which turned a brownish gold. There was nothing violet about this piece at all, but there was plenty of noise.
I drew a slug by accident!
Dale and Sean arrived to witness the second go at violet noise. This time, I put enamel white and pink frit on the first gather, then coated them in another clear gather. This would keep the white away from direct heat.
I thought it looked a bit boring, so, at the last minute, I dipped the open top in more of the purple frit. This didn't stretch nor melt the way the first coating did. It looked like a completely different color. This is where the noise comes in, because the specks at the top turned out to be making a completely different sound. (What, you don't hear it? You're not synaesthetic?)
Okay, so what if I put the enamel white on the surface again, but use a purple that doesn't reduce? Nothing happens. The noise would have to come from me pulling the top.
Violet Noise #1, #2, and #3:
The next night, I used the last of the large basement shards. I picked them up on the first gather this time, and gathered over them to make them behave. It muted the colors a little bit, but I got the shape I was aiming for without having to fight the glass.
I had enough cut-off bubble mold marbles to make two more drinking glasses. They didn't go nearly as well as last week's had.
The first one got interesting. The top color, capri blue, looked as if it were oozing into the clear layer. What was probably happening is that there wasn't an even coating of colored glass on the marble to begin with. The effect was almost as if there were two layers of blue on top of the clear layer. Meanwhile, the blue aventurine marble at the bottom was off-kilter and blew out on a slant.
This, quite by accident, was Cerulean Drift #4.
I tried to be cautious with the next one. I didn't blow it out enough. The two layers of blue aventurine remained separated from the clear in the middle, but the cup was thick, narrow, and boring compared to the other two.
I'd dragged the bubble mold into the room; I figured I ought to use it. Running out of time, I rolled the first gather in gold aventurine and put it into the bubble mold. I didn't blow it out enough. The top and bottom were very thick.
Pumpkin Master happened by, took one look at the top, and said, "Pull it and trim it." I shook my head. Not enough time. I'm still bad at that skill.
When the cup came out of the annealer, I knew it was destined for the waste bucket. First, though, I had to document that, like cheap jewelry, the gold had turned green!
I ended up taking the cup home to analyze its ugliness for a few more days. Then I took it back and threw it into the discard bucket. I'd tackle this color again, but first, vermillion reach.
I'd had a vision of this at 1:30 in the morning when I woke up to pee. My half-asleep brain gives me far more credit than my awake hands can accomplish. Still, Sometimes said it was too tall for the middle shelf of the annealer, which is something I've only ever managed before by accident.
The second one got away from me. What was going to be a bowl ended up being a hat, which is, in the classroom, a sign of failure. This hat-bowl was tilted, too. The only thing going for it was that the vermillion reaches were on the bowl part. When it came out of the annealer, I didn't even photograph it before I sent it to the bucket. When I came back for the Sunday class, it was gone. Someone on Saturday liked it enough to take it home, I guess. Or they smashed it to use the colors again.
The next one was a fishbowl with the same colors, and it fell off the punty right before I was about to put it away.
The fourth one made it into the annealer because I was playing it safe.
IV: Return of Return of the Bubble Mold
I took a scoop of clear glass and coated it with five layers of gold aventurine. Chasing the shape I'd lost the day before, I got my fishbowl.
The gold did not turn green.
A jade that I got as a cutting in 2009 found a home in the gold fishbowl. (It had been in a vase made from "old gold" aventurine, which I could never get to be anything but dark brown. The vase was blown unevenly, thin at the bottom, and scuffed where I'd dropped it while sanding the bottom flat. I'd almost thrown the thing away at the time, but I needed a pot for the jade. Now the vase is in the trash, where it ought to have been all along.)
I was a little more adventurous the second time around. I'm trying to learn how to open bowls without spinning them out. I'm not finding it easy. This one came out slightly oblong.
When I'd made Cerulean Drift #2, I'd wondered if the colors would do better on a white background. Cerulean Drift #4 is what happened:
I swapped out capri blue for aqua metallic for Cerulean Drift #5. I wish I could show you a picture of this when I was opening the top. It was a rainbow grading from red where the glass was hottest, to blue at the bottom, where it was cooling off.
Some colors look the same in the annealer as they do when they've cooled down.
(The left side isn't lumpy; it's a reflection.)
Even though the wood is kept wet, it gradually burns with repeated use. Eventually, a 6 cm block burns down to 8 cm, or even clean through. Once a block has a hole in it, it's useless. The front gets thin and chips off. Holes and chips snag the glass.
V: Mid-Semester Purge
Some glassblowers are team players. Others are not. I'll skip the drama, because in the end it all worked out. However, I did spend a couple of days fuming. A small purge helped.
I got rid of the two cannonball-weight hot-air balloon fails that I'd put next to a rock in the front yard. They bugged me. They made the wrong noise. I replaced them with a splat.
The saffron bowl I'd made with Murano was taking up too much shelf space. I took it into work, filled with potting soil, and transplanted a rangy, root-bound pothos* that had outgrown the vessel I'd had it in (another fail that became a flower pot instead of landing in the trash). I snipped half a dozen cuttings from the plant to let them root, figuring that the violence I subjected the plant to in getting it out of its original pot might end up killing it. If it survives, I guess I'll have to make another large bowl.
I gave away a couple of long-neck vases. I moved everything off the Window Sill of Judgment onto the give away/sell shelf.
We are 8 weeks in as I write this. Buying two slots this semester was a really bad idea. I'm now giving away pieces I like enough to keep but have no room for. When this semester is over, I will have run out of permanent space downstairs.
VI: We need blocks!
We've been needing blocks since September. The college, in its infinite wisdom, will pay for safety supplies such as gloves and glasses, but it will not pay for tools. If we burn through our blocks, we have to use our club money to buy more.
A block is, more or less, a wooden ladle that we use to shape glass before we blow it out. The blocks are different sizes to accommodate different-sized gathers. The blocks are kept wet. The glass rides on a layer of steam. Here's a picture I stole off the internet.
The blocks were burned through by the end of last semester. Now, we're down to blocks so thin that they're too large to shape small gathers.
All the way back to last semester, I'd been asking about the prospect of new ones, only to receive vague answers. Enough was enough. Seven weeks into the spring workshop, I decided to take matters into my own hands.
After a day's worth of group chat (no reporters in the mix) and a few phone calls by Rose ("you have to know people"), I was promised that, if I paid for a set of blocks, I'd be reimbursed with club money. We'd accumulated a few thousand dollars from glass sales over the past couple of years.
There's a fine line between being a team player and a sucker. Maybe I crossed it when I placed the order.
Anyway, we have a new set of blocks. We need two sets. Maybe three. Glass Ninja, who is also a woodworker, is taking them over to be 3D scanned and the specs downloaded. "I have some cherry wood at home," he said.
Our blocks are made from cherry wood. When cherry wood burns, it smells so good!
