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Hot Techniques.
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Blown Glass
This ancient technique has not suffered any changes
since its discovery.
The tools needed for this type of glasswork are basically:
a hollow iron rod varying in size from 1.20 to 1.80 meters
and glassmaker jacks. Notwithstanding their simple form, such
objects are the main glassmaker’s tools, the rest of
the work relies in the skill of the artisan, which is acquired
by experience.
The rod is dipped into the crucible where glass is already
fused. This state of glass is characterized by a honey-like
consistency.
With continuous rotating movements the glass is rolled on
the marver to form an initial shape, then air is blown into
the opposite end to form a bubble. The blowing continues until
a bubble of sufficient size for the finished product is formed.
For example, if the object is to become a bottle, the glassmaker
sits on his chair and rotates the blow-pipe on the arms of
the chair, which are called handbarrows. Later on, with a
thick piece of wet newspaper, the jacks and a pontil, he shapes
the glass by blowing and constricting the piece till achieving
the desired shape. Once this work is finished, the piece is
placed in an annealing kiln to provide the required cooling
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Mould-blown glass
Glassware made by the process of blowing the molten glass
(bubble) into a mould, which is blown to take on the shape
of the mould. The piece is then decorated according to the
chosen design and is placed in an annealing kiln.
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Cased glass
Glassware made of two or more layers of glass of different
colours and reheated so that the two layers fuse together,
provided the layers share a similar thermal coefficient
of expansion to enable them to be united into a single piece.
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Glass paste
Mix of finely grind glass, agglutinated with liquid (water
or oil). The resulting paste is placed into a mould, which
is later set into a kiln to be fused.
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Cast glass
Technique whereby molten glass is poured into a mould made
out of refractory clay, fused sands or iron. Since the cooling
curve depends solely on each object, some massive pieces
have taken up to two or three months to reach total hardness.
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  Blown
glass and flame stretched technique. |
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Pressed glass
This technique, known in Alexandria since ancient times,
was improved in the XIX century in the United States of
America. Currently, glass industry uses a press with compressed
air and the artist is solely involved in the designing of
the mould.
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Kiln forming technique glass
This type of glass is obtained by laminated glass, exposed
to high temperatures and gravity until acquiring the shape
of the mould or model.
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Flame worked glass
in this technique, a blowlamp with oxygen is needed. With
this flame working devise glass reaches the necessary temperature
to be flamed worked, fused, modeled and blown.
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