Tuesday, February 22, 2011

Sharing...

makes both people happy....  In this case, I'm happy and my friend Kelli Pope is happy.  Kelli made some beads that I bisque-fired and returned to her to glaze.  She did and sent them back to me.  Not all that she made fit in one firing since there were lots of pendants and I am not really equipped for pendant firing.  So, I did what I could and then put the rest in my firing that I did last night.

Here are Kelli's pendants...


Here are my beads...



And this little group is a very cool turquoise glaze that I bought in powder form.  The picture doesn't really do the colors justice.  Anyhow, the one thing that I didn't like about this glaze was the fact that it ran a little too freely.  I tried to control that by experimenting with adding silica to the glaze. 

 I used 3 different samples.  First I added 5% to group 1, the 2nd 10% and the 3rd 15%.  The results were this:  I don't think it did too much to change any of them. 

Although, the running was minimal on the 3rd stoneware beads (top right 3rd), it ran on the porcelain (bottom right 3rd).  Perhaps, the answer is something besides silica or I should just be careful about what kind of beads I apply this to.  I think bead choice will be my next experiment since this turquoise is a beautiful color and I do hope to be able to use lots of it!


Don't forget to check out our group blog for my mini giveaway.... 


Just click the giveaway button on the left sidebar to be taken to the post!


7 comments:

SummersStudio said...

Lovely colours! I find that many of the glazes I use run on porcelain but not on stoneware. I think it has to do with the porcelain fluxing the glaze because porcelain itself is so glass like. I've been firing cone 6 glazes at 5 and that's fixed up a lot of my problems and I still get nice mature glazes.

Artisan Beads Plus said...

Thanks for the tip, LeAnn! I will try that and see what happens. I also have a white cone 6 stoneware... I was going to experiment some with that too....

Unknown said...

Love the turquoise color! I'm forwarding the Awesome Blog Award to you, http://gbkoru.blogspot.com/2011/02/awesome-blog-award.html
Hugs, Gunilla

Artisan Beads Plus said...

Thanks Gunilla! This is a first. I will follow the link and see what to do.... What a surprise!!!

Amy (Blighty Boutique) said...

gorgeous colours x

Artisan Beads Plus said...

Thanks Amy!

Kelli said...

Gorgeous turquoise Mary Ann!!! May have to have some of those for my stash!! :)