A variety of engraved glass projects....

It is now the middle of June!! I still feel chilly and I wonder if I will warm up at all this year!!!  At least I have been busy, you can tell by my lack of blog posts! (although I do keep my Facebook page fairly up to date) Here are a selection of engravings I have completed (and one not quite...)

 

The first item I will mention is the Button Project that has just opened in Macclesfield. For this project I hand carved out a 3cm piece of crystal with a thin green overlay and hand engraved a simple oak design, drilling 2 little holes in the middle as this has to be a functional button. This is completely unique and I hope that if someone buys it that they sew it onto a garment. It looks good with a dark background but white will show the subtle green. I would love to see where it ends up. I suppose it could also be put in a little box frame to hang on a wall. Oh the fun one could have.

There are a large number of buttons on display and they are all for sale, I think they are about £50 each.

For more informations please visit their page, I will add the link at the end of this page.

 

I was asked to engrave a cat, so my instructions to the client was to please take some good photos, level with the cat so it is not foreshortened in the picture. Well a dog is easier to photograph but out of a large number of images I chose this one .I hand engraved it onto a Dartington Crystal candleholder.

 The above image shows a little church which I engraved underneath a paperweight and around the edge, I converted the image in CorelDraw and Photoshop and then sandblasted it to keep it simple and bold.

 I had a lovely student to teach, DR. Keith Charlton. My teaching is on a Saturday only, from 9 - 5 with lunch inbetween. It is a one to one basis and I will gear the lesson according to your needs. Please contact me for further information.

 As usual there are many awards and presentations being commissioned and these crystal blocks are lovely for this purpose.

 Do you remember my Ice Cave II ? Well the person who bought it (as a special gift)  requested the recipients initials and date of birth to be engraved underneath it in the form of jewellery hallmarks , what a cool idea!!  I blasted them very deeply.

 I had a lovely request for a crystal upright plaque to be engraved for someone's Mum. This was to sit on top of an organ which had been donated to a church in her name. A considerable amount of lettering in the front and 3 poppies at the back.

 The above was a heavy cut crystal vase for a presentation, I combined sandblasting with hand engraving for this, I love this combination of techniques.

 I hand engraved this optical crystal block with 2 boxing hares (they reflect in the block) to go into an Easter exhibition, I made a little YouTube video of the engraving of this piece which can be seen here. http://youtu.be/0XKI666b_rM It did not sell at the exhibition and is still available so let me know if you are interested. It is £390.00 including postage (UK) I will quote on postage outside of UK.

 

 The above is a gorgeous crystal jug hand blown by the Georgian Glassmakers. It was a commission from one of my regular clients. the rustic grapes (I love this subject you may have noticed)...are hand engraved (drill) all around the body. Link for the makers at the end of this page.

Every year I have several golf trophies and prizes to engrave and this was the Spexhall Huntsman and Hounds Football Club Golf Day, held as always at Halesworth Golf Club where I play, I can recommend it for all round excellence ! I worked a lot over the weekend on this job and drank a lot of coffee and tea!! I am leaning on my sandblasting cabinet in the picture above.

  

 (below) I had a client bring a delightful and very heavy crystal bowl, very old too. It was a family heirloom and destined to be a birthday gift for a family member. The lady wanted it engraved with lettering all round the rim, a combination of English, Greek, Spanish and Russian! Under the base, a family crest and some more lettering.

 The bowl was badly marked, looked like a patch of acid in one area too and so I managed to very successfully polish that out before engraving. A lovely bowl to engrave, the quality was amazing.

 Another intriguing little commission was this one, (above) the client had a very old very based glass that belonged to a long lost relative of his mother who used to drink out of it. It had broken 2 years before and he rescued the remains and after all that time managed to find someone (?) to grind and polish the base into a delightful little paperweight and then he ask me to engrave a ring of roses. She knew nothing of this plan and I would have loved to have seen her reaction.

  

....and then I was commissioned to engrave 2 little piggies on lead crystal whisky glasses....I enjoyed that!! Working like a little factory, I part engraved each one in stages to try and match them well. Hand engraving is like painting, you cannot make them identical, each is completely unique despite using the same artwork, each drill mark is as a brush stroke.

 

I spent a few days hand engraving a Selfridges recently, for Acqua di Parma, gorgeous fragrances!

 I had a commission to engrave a happy little scene of 2 squirrels on a crystal block. It started with a scrappy sketch......

 

Then I hand engraved it on every facet. On 2 of the facets I sandblasted a personal message from the client for the recipient.

 

I am busy finishing (hopefully this weekend...) this gorgeous little crystal jug. (below) It is a Wedgwood Crystal with the old Portland Vase hallmark of Wedgwood underneath which I had bought in perfect condition for a fair ages ago and had on display waiting for inspiration. It is a commission for a regular client of mine who loved the shape. The crystal is utterly gorgeous to engrave, there is nothing like Lead Crystal for a beautiful clean cut!!

 I was extremely flattered to have been featured in the latest copies of Yachting Matters and The Yacht Owner magazines. I am extremely grateful to Colin Squire the editor and publisher.

 You can see the magazine contents including this feature on pages 177/8/9. http://www.yachtingmatters.com/yachtingmatters/24/index.html

Thank you for visiting my blog, I hope that I can catch up news sooner next time otherwise there is too much to include! Please "Like" my Facebook page , if you can, for more regular updates. I know that many of you are not on Facebook which is why I have this blog.

Enjoy the sunshine!!

Links:

The Button Project: http://www.barnabyfestival.org.uk//events?tid=12&tid_1=All
Georgian Glassmakers  http://www.georgianglassmakers.co.uk/index.htm

The end of June 2012. Summer anyone?

It has been a few months. To be honest I have been reluctant to post in this blog as it has been so difficult to add photos, I had to fight with the mechanisms. I see that once again things have changed. I am very glad to see this, encouraged, and I hope things are going to be easier and actually work properly now.

(well in fact not.....I have just lost the last 2 hours of blogging....so I am taking a deep breath and will have one more go)

I have been making changes to my engraving setup. I now offer a glass and crystal on-line store including a commercial glass engraving service alongside my own personal engraving service. This means that if you require fairly simple glass engraving,  you can do this with ease. Choose your glass, your font, your wording, an image if you wish, or upload your own logo, payment is through a secure server. I have in the past been turning work away because I am too busy, but this is a service provided by a team of professional engravers of my choice who can deal with your order with wonderful efficiency and whose work has my stamp of approval. Please let me know what you think of this shopping experience and don't hesitate to ask me any questions you may have.

Chilford Hall and one of the paintings destroyed in the fire.

There are so many things happening, but that is life, some good, some bad. 

The terrible news of the burning down of Chilford Hall, our wonderful venue for the Cambridge Glass Fair, means that I do not yet know where or when the next glass fair will be, our organisers have said it will go ahead, so watch this space for this September fair.

I am battling against the annual grass pollen, wheezing and coughing and sneezing and have insanely itchy eyes. I live on a farm so this does not help, once in my workshop I calm down a bit. Roll on July!

Happy news is I have safely reached my 50th birthday and am content with life. I think I have always been 50 and love it. Still go to the gym at least twice a week and play my golf when I can. I have to defend my title of lady champion again this August....just need this pollen count to go down so I can get practicing again. I did manage to eagle our 18th hole, par 5, a couple of weeks ago, so it is still in there!

In the last couple of months I have had 2 lovely editorials for which I am very grateful:

Leading glass magazine in Brazil, Vidro Impresso

The first edition of Uniquely Away.

There are a number of glass exhibitions coming up this year and I will have pieces in 3 of them. More details to come. Here is a taste of one. Ice Cave II.

An interesting commission

I have added a new page to my website, showing a selection of commissions for royalty from 3 different countries and other VIP clients work.

Well commiserations to England footy fans, just been watching them lose by penalties, what a horrid way to lose.  Better luck next time.

Return to main website: Lesley Pyke Limited - Glass Engraving  www.glassengraving.biz