Monday, September 21, 2009

Stained Glass Workshop Last Saturday



The Model A Club was having a "restoration clinic" for the guys, about compression and valves, such fascinating subjects, and since it was at Tom P.'s house, and his wife Kathy is a stained glass artist, she offered to have a workshop for the ladies.


They live on a hill in the Texas Hill Country, and it's a beautiful, unique place. Tom has built metal sheds for several of his antique cars, and with the false fronts he built, he has a "village." When John, my friend Laura, and I arrived, the guys were heading to those metal garages and we ladies went inside for Kathy's stained glass class.





Kathy had selected a pattern and created the outer frame. She had each of us do a piece or two of the design. The pattern was already cut up and taped on the back of the rough-cut pieces of glass. We scored them and snapped them into shapes, then ground them on a special grinder to get a close fit to each paper pattern piece. Next, we put copper foil around the edge and Kathy fit them into the overall design, grinding off a little more glass if necessary for a perfect fit. In the 2-hour session, all but two of the pieces were fitted for the picture, and those needed a little fine fitting before Kathy can foil them, then soldier the center seams of the picture. I had never seen this kind of work done before, and truly, it was beautiful and fascinating.

I couldn't resist putting up that last picture - it's me with their dog Zeus, who is quite the ladies' man. If you stop petting him, he taps you gently with his paw...
Kathy's work is stunning, and both Laura and I took lots of pictures. We also got some pictures of Tom and Kathy's amazing Hill Country view.

I could see th guys had a great time, too, but in my opinion, the girls came out ahead on this club meeting!

Examples of Kathy's work:












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