How Woven Metal and Glass Come Together

Making a woven metal and glass piece is labor intensive and takes a few days from start to finish, but I've never seen another technique that creates this kind of sparkle and shine. People are always curious as to what kind of stone this is - and are always surprised when they hear that I make them from scratch myself!

In a nutshell - here are the secrets behind the sparkle.

STEP ONE: First I fuse the glass. I take pieces of glass, layer them together, then fuse them in my kiln. A kiln cycle generally takes about 12 -15 hours, so this is the part I really have to plan ahead for. Here you see a kiln shelf full of little glass squares with glass bubbles on top that will end up being Woven Rain Earrings.
STEP TWO: Then, I need to weave wire into a narrow piece of woven metal fabric. I use a medieval fingerweaving technique to weave the wire. Each strip comes out to be about 1/4 inch wide and about 30 inches long. With some of the larger pieces, it might take 3-5 strips to cover the entire piece of glass so you can see that those strips of woven metal fabric go fast. Here is a brief video showing me weaving the wire.
STEP THREE: Once I have the glass fused and the wire woven, I put the two elements together. I really wanted it to look like the wire and the glass were fused together, but actually doing that created an unsightly mess. It took a few years to find the right combination of materials to create the look I wanted, but I'm happy with the result!
STEP FOUR: Admire and recieve compliments! One of my favorite parts of this technique is that the back of the piece is just as interesting as the front.