Rainbow woes part 2

 So the next step in my quest for perfect rainbows....Bullseye glass!

Bullseye is CoE 90 and much less finicky than CoE 104 in many ways, though I do often find the rods a tad shocky, especially French Vanilla.

The hearts on the left are over a base of Bullseye clear wrapped with stringers in various bright shades.

The orange looks a tad misty and the aqua and violet not as bright as I would have liked but overall I am pretty happy :D

I was super thrilled with these little rounds, all the bright stringers wrapped around a core of French Vanilla and encased in clear.

I am quite disappointed with Bullseye clear, there are quite a lot of micro bubbles in it, similar in many ways to Effetre 004. So the next thing is to try some other brands of CoE 90 clear...I have heard shat Schott clear is pretty good but hard to track down in the UK.

TTFN, Jolene x

Rainbow woes........

 I loved making these and was tickled pink when they came out of the kiln looking like little sweeties yesterday morning. This morning I spotted and incompatibly crack in one of the hearts - literally heart breaking.

They were made over a core of CiM Peace with tiny wraps of bog standard Effetre colours over the top and encased with 006. The cracking is internal, partial and only over the "hot" colours.

So a few hours of pouring over internet and I found a good lot of interesting info on Lampwork Etc which talks about Cadmium based colours being inconsistent under encasement.

These rainbow rounds came out of the kiln looking perfect this morning. I made them before the first crack appeared on the hearts and just a few hours later 3 now show small fractures internally too.

So some things to try - making a core of clear glass under white before layering on the rainbow or making the rainbow directly over a core of clear. Or making a similar design using Bullseye glass which is CoE 90.....update coming soon.

Have a super evening, Jolene x

Charity Auctions By Keiara

Keiara Darling raises cash for small UK Charities by auctioning beautiful handmade jewellery and textiles on her Facebook page. Every month she features a different charity and raises awareness, for April she is working to help a great charity called Once, we were Soldiers.


Once, we were Soldiers was set up by Andy Spiers to provide support to homeless ex-forces personnel in the UK. You can read more about Once, we were Soldiers and their mission to support homeless veterans in the UK here on their website http://owwsoldiers.co.uk/our-mission

For now I will just leave you with some more eye candy, jewellery made with artisan British lampwork beads and her stunning crochet items. I'd like to say a big thank you to Keiara for letting me use her wonderful photographs here on my blog.

To support Keiara and her wonderful fund raising activities please visit her page xx Jolene
https://www.facebook.com/lovebykeiara