Another Happy Install

It is so much fun to go on certain installs. When the client is there and thrilled with our work, it really is fun. Yesterday, we installed three transom windows. Cindi really liked them, we know this because she kept repeating every sentence three times. "I love it, love it, love it." "They look better than I imagined, they really look better than I imagined they would, I can't believe it, they look so much better than I ever imagined!"

It really was fun for us to see and hear her reaction. We try not to do installs, because they take up so much time and many times it's better handled by those who have the tools. That's why we never install insulated units, we let professional installers we work with do the installs.

The great thing about working with Cindi is that she knew what she wanted, she was decisive on her decisions and when we delivered early, she was so happy. She is one of those 80% customers who are easy to work with, love the design, love the price, everything goes so smoothly that the job is easy. The only drawback is that because everything goes so smoothly, you almost forget these type of clients easily. It's the ones that make life miserable for you that we remember. Why is that?

Salmon Swim Upstream

Every day, the news is full of bleak reports of economic downturns. The bad stories and negative images is enough to make a person give up hope (that's why they called it the Great DEPPRESSION). With the trials that the building trades have experienced, I confess that I’ve even given thought to taking work as a tech writer again and putting stained glass on part-time.

But, successful people advise that when times are tough, there is greater opportunity. It's a time when the weak players are shaken out and the way is clear for innovative companies to succeed and forge new paths.

Salmon swim upstream, we can too! So, even though we're late, we went ahead and mailed off our application (and fees) so we can be an official part of the Parade Of Homes this year. We've been in homes three of the last four years, but we've never felt prepared to make the $450 commitment to actually join the homebuilders association. But, since we want to be Salmon and not guppies, we went ahead and joined.

We're also working on mailings to send out to potential clients. I've bought some lists so I better start sending something out!

Now these two little baby steps may sound small, but the only real money we've ever spent on advertising has been on yellow page ads and an on-line web program that didn't really do us any good. So these activities could far out-stretch our previous efforts.

Last year we made less money than the year before, but we were working on a donated project which took a lot of our earnings time away. I think if we buckle down and really market ourselves, we'll either get results or find new ways to get results.

How To Shorten A Stained Glass Panel

I felt like a transom window I was building was wrong, but each time I checked the measurements we took, they were right on. When we showed up to deliver the windows, it was obvious that it was too long. So I had to shorten it to fit.

To go to the article with all the pictures, click on the link on the title of this entry.

How Did That Happen?

Ever ask yourself that? There are times you ask and you really have no idea. Most of the time when unexpected things come up, we know right away what went wrong. “Oh, I forgot to tell you not to paint the fence when the wind is blowing.”

The other day, we delivered some windows to a client and one was way too big. The client asked, “How did that happen?” I didn’t have an answer. I had thought several times when I was making the window, “Is this really how long this window is?” It seemed too long, but I went back and checked our measurements and it was supposed to be that big.

When we discovered the problem, we took back the window to shorten it 40” and we checked our measurement. Yep, we wrote down that is was 84, not 44. Jeanne immediately took the blame, “It’s my handwriting, so I screwed up!” Then I pointed out that I was reading the tape measure and I could have read it out wrong, so there was really no way to determine who was to blame.

I used to be really ready to assign blame, but I’m actively trying to overcome that habit. Who cares who made the mistake, we still have to fix it and we’re both aware of what happened, so we’ll be vigilant to try to avoid the same thing in the future. A friend told me that when he measures. He first takes all measurements in inches, then he re-measures in feet and inches. This way he has two sets of numbers and when a question comes up, he can verify that they are both the same length. If not, he can pinpoint the fact that there really is a problem.

The Big Switch

I have been interested in reading the sites of several family members and the other day I decided to really get more serious about the way I blog. In the past I've divided up my blog into this site which houses copies of the newsletter I write and my “Stained Glass Artists Survival Guide.” I realize that this really impacts my writing. I can only blog about Stained Glass and I have to divide everything between two sites.

So I’m going to put all my posts here, because it’s more about my life. All my adventures are Stained Glass Adventures.

How To Rebuild A Leaded Glass Window -Mar 2008

When the perspective client arrived with his window that "needed a little work", it was taped and wrapped to a board to keep it from falling apart. We explained that we'd have to completely rebuild the window, so he asked if we could make some design changes while we were at it. We agreed, while securing the added stipulation that we would rebuild it using the copper foil method.

We unwrapped the window and assessed the damage. Every joint was weakened and falling apart. The lead was brittle and crumbled quite readily. The age of the thing and it's time riddled damage was quite amazing.

To Read the whole article with the pictures that go with it, click on the title above.

It Makes A Difference

Just the other day, a married couple called to talk about the windows that had just been installed in their home. The husband said some very nice things about the sidelight and door inserts and was about to comment on the other panels, which went in their living room, when his wife took the phone away from him. She explained to Jeanne that she had to talk to her because he just wasn’t being enthusiastic enough in his praise of the beauty of the windows! Then she began to try to describe how marvelous the windows were and how pleased they were. She tried to express how happy they were with them and what a difference they make in the look of the home. She just couldn’t say enough to describe how incredible the windows were!

We knew exactly what she meant! When we delivered the panels to their home, as we were leaving, ½ of the windows had been installed and the craftsmen who had built their woodwork were preparing to complete the install of the other panels. Jeanne and I talked about how the stained glass that goes in a home really is the jewelry that adorns it!

When you get dressed up to go to the theatre or to a dance or any formal affair, no woman would think to go out without wearing her makeup and jewelry! Yet we sometimes see homeowners who don’t realize that something is missing until they have added the finishing touch of stained glass to their home.

By contrast to that joyful experience, we worked recently on a home built by a builder that we’ve done quite a bit of work with in the past. The floor plan of the home was one that was similar to several other homes we’ve installed stained glass in previously. But this homeowner was very budget conscious and didn’t want to spend too much on the completed home. So they had opted to get the most plain design we offer in two of their transom windows and have clear glass placed in all of the rest of the transoms in the house.

What hurt us as glass artists was not that we weren’t doing the same volume of work in the home that we normally would, but that these homeowners would not see the opportunity to really make their home something special. They were going to miss out on the joy that those first homeowners have experienced, the chance to really have some elements that they could enthusiastically jump up and down over, that would bring a smile to their hearts and lift their spirits every day that they live in the home!

I called the builder and encouraged him to talk to them and at least convince them to allow us to cut “seeded” glass for the transoms that weren’t going to get the simple art glass panels. They would then at least have a little more visual interest. They would have a “hint” of the stained glass possibility. And upon hearing that the cost of the seeded glass was only about $15 more than what clear glass would have been, they agreed that seeded glass would be a good choice.

That was actually a relief to us! We aren’t stained glass snobs. We do appreciate a good clear glass window that allows a view to be shown. We don’t feel that every single window in a home needs to be filled with art. And yet, there are times when the possibility of what could be just screams out at us so loudly that we KNOW that there should be glass there! And all we can do as responsible advisors is to try to convey the vision of what could be, of the possibility, of the opportunity to create something special. Those who have lived with stained glass understand what we’re talking about because they’ve experienced the joy that simple sunlight can bring. They know what it’s like to see sunlight come streaming through an inspirational panel of glass as they’ve eaten their morning bowl of cereal and contemplated the positive joy of life. They’ve experienced how the sunlight can be refracted on a sunny afternoon with playful rainbows cast from beveled glass pieces running up the wall and then the ceiling. And they may have even seen how a stained glass window seems to glow with positive energy on an overcast day, a beacon and a magnet, gathering up the available light and magnifying it, casting it into the heart of the viewer. A magnificent ray of hope!

Somehow, this is our job, to teach people of the endless possibilities that stained glass represents. If you’re reading this article, you probably already understand, that’s why you’ve found it. Those who have lived with it get it. The transcendent inspiration that comes from sunlight passing through glass can be so awe inspiring, no wonder it found it’s way into churches in the 14th and 15th centuries. No wonder those who have it are so fiercely happy about it and find it hard to even describe the emotions that come from living with it. Stained glass is simply beautiful, it makes a difference!

How To Add Coining To A Panel For A Very "French" Look

When we work with Candace, a designer of note in Salt Lake City, she loves to have us build windows with "French" diamonds. In January 2007, the newsletter was about cutting the glass in that diamond pattern efficiently. This month we show how to achieve the coining look that really makes this glass style pop.

Read the whole article with pictures by clicking on the title above.

The Painted Leaf Project

When we worked on a recent project of four transom windows for Kent Walker, one of our favorite architects, we wondered if we could paint leaves on some of the big panels. This would allow us to skip some of the lead lines, allowing the design to be more open and natural. The pictures and full article can be seen at the following link:
http://www.betterstainedglass.com/Newsletter/Archives/2008Jan-paintedleaf/paintedleaf.htm

Is that all there is?

Is that all there is? Peggy Lee asked the question over and over in a song that hinted at disappointment and despair. And I’ve recently heard it from the mouths of several of my grandkids. Christmas time is here and they tear excitedly into the wrapping paper and then stand with starry eyes like sharks in a feeding frenzy and ask, “Is that all there is? I want another present to open.”

Jeanne points out to me that the kids who say this all seem to be the same age, around four. So I’m figuring that until that age, kids are overwhelmed by Christmas and then at four they have begun to expect to be overwhelmed, but their brains have matured and they can handle more excitement and so Christmas time disappointment begins to set in. And it never goes away unless you get to the next level. Many people never get to that next level where it’s the giving and the doing for others that is the rush of the season. And so they find solace and comfort in the Peggy Lee song, “let’s break out the booze and have a ball, if that’s all there is.”

But when you begin to get a taste of the next level, you begin to experience a whole new dimension to Christmastime and to life in general. I think it’s called “joy”, you know that happiness that is real, not fleeting and it builds you, it doesn’t tear you down, like drinking or drug use does. Well, I’m wrong, it is fleeting, sometimes it’s just a momentary rush, like that brief flash that comes when the good occurs, you see the child smile, you ease the pain of another or you imagine that you’ve made a positive difference. Flash! You’re filled, if only briefly with that joy. And it’s good, the kind of feeling that mostly comes from mature and thoughtful effort.

The disappointment can still be there, alongside of the happiness, as a kind of legacy that we leave to our kids, left to us by our parents, the false traditions of our elders. Mature people fight against the disappointment and look for true joy. And that effort is worth it.

Sometimes, we as stained glass artists can be tempted to be discouraged, to wonder, “Is that all there is?” Maybe a show wasn’t as successful as we had hoped or a sale that we thought we had slips through our fingers and we’re left feeling a little down. This is when we need to take seriously the advice of Wallace D. Wattles, author of “The Science Of Getting Rich.”

“When you make a failure, it is because you have not asked for enough; keep on, and a larger thing than you were seeking will certainly come to you. Remember this.”
His advice to ignore the failure and avoid discouragement is sound and will lead us to positively reach greater happiness instead of wallowing in imagined misery.

The Peggy Lee song gives us good advice and bad. Breaking out the booze won’t rescue us from discouragement, but the advice to “keep on dancing” is sound. Just keep on, keeping on and you’ll find the success you seek around the next turn, or the next, or.....

A Pleasant Surprise

I get such bad service from people at different companies that I work with so frequently, that I often don’t ask for help.

For example: we recently bought a dozen soldering irons and the tips on them went bad quickly, one within 24 hours and most didn’t last a week. When I mentioned it to my distributor, my sales gal told me to send them back in so they could evaluate them. I had already thrown them out, I had taken a picture of all of them in a pile, but that wasn’t good enough. I didn’t lose any sleep over the incident, but it does illustrate my attitude towards products. I figure no one is going to support their inferior products and if I have to replace them for my clients, I’ll be the one eating the cost.

No big deal, I just don’t expect much and so I’m not disappointed.

Last year I bought an Inland Wizard grinder to replace an old grinder that had worn out. I chose it because it has a nice wide table and I thought it looked pretty professional. But the first time I went to move the grinder bit, the set screw was frozen. So I drilled it out and after much beating and pounding, I got the grinder bit off, but I had damaged the motor and the grinder was toast. I simply tossed it in the trash and ordered a new one, which I’m careful to keep lubricated properly to prevent a bit from freezing.

So when my new Twin Spin Grinder from Inland had a frozen set screw, I was careful. I first ordered a new grinder bit so that I could repair the grinder and keep it in service. Then I used caution in how I drilled out the grinder bit so that I wouldn’t put unnecessary strain on the shaft and the motor. But still, by the time I got the grinder head removed, the motor and shaft had a bad wobble. This time, I didn’t feel like tossing the grinder since I had that replacement head and I don’t think they go bad very often, so I took the grinder apart and found that it would be easy to replace the motor if I had one. My distributor didn’t carry them so I had to look on-line.

When I got to www.inlandcraft.com I found contact information and called customer service. What a surprise! They INSISTED on helping me. First, the fellow wanted me to send in my grinder so he could fix it. When I explained that it was taken apart and it would be easier to just buy a replacement motor, he insisted that I send the motor to him so he could replace it. Turns out that the grinder has a 5-year warranty. I couldn’t believe it. Makes me wish that I hadn’t thrown out that other grinder. Guess what brand of grinder I’m buying to replace that other one that’s over 20 years old?
For more articles on stained glass visit http://www.gommstudios.com and click on the How To Find Stained Glass Articles Link

Repair Stained Glass That Has Separated 12/07

Our studio repaired an arched window before and when the owner of the panel hung it up, she still didn't use all the rings that were designed to hold it, so we decided to add additional reinforcement to it after we got it back in place. Maybe that will keep it from coming apart.

The orange and yellow curved pieces of glass had separated from the purple glass.

Make sure and visit http://www.betterstainedglass.com/Newsletter/Archives/2007Dec-seperatedwindow/seperatedwindow.htm to see the pictures that go with this article.

How To Install Stained Glass In A Cabinet Door -Nov 2007

We get requests for instructions on how to install glass quite often. It sometimes presents us with a dilemma, because as you're doing an install, it's often difficult to stop and take pictures.
We recently installed a number of panels in cabinet doors which gave us a chance to film the process.

Start by checking that the glass fits in the opening. You don't want to lay the glass down in silicone and then find out the glass doesn't fit.
Lay out the tools you'll need, silicone caulk (or paintable caulk if the application calls for it), a roll of toilet paper and a nearby trash can to get rid of the unwanted caulk.

Read the whole article with pictures by clicking the title above.

Warm Glass Book Review

Warm Glass by Philippa Beveridge,Ignasi Domenech and Eva Pacual

Andy works for a local stained glass studio and teaches classes at BYU. I enjoy talking to him about stained glass and he is full of really good advice about kiln fired glass. Recently he recommended Warm Glass to me. I got it and I love it.
This volume is full of examples of work which has been created in a kiln, but it's much more, it's like a classroom in a book, a primer on what went right and what went wrong. It is by far the best book I've seen to learn about kiln fired glass.

You really need to get this book.

For more articles on stained glass visit http://www.gommstudios.com/stained-glass-articles/articles.htm

How To Reinforce A Stained Glass Skylight -Oct 2007

I have a tendency to "over build" projects, because it worries me that something might happen that wasn't planned. So I add extra wood to shelves so they won't sag and extra time for glass to cool in the kiln so it won't break. Sometimes these extra steps may be unnecessary but they give me peace of mind.
But when it comes time to reinforce a stained glass panel which is going to be over head, you just can't be too careful!

Read the whole article with pictures by clicking the title above.

Should I Start My Own Stained Glass Business?

Every stained glass student who builds a piece of glass and enjoys the process, toys with the idea of starting a stained glass business. I give all of our students the same advice. I wrote an article http://www.gommstudios.com/stained-glass-articles/howcanImakeit.htm which gives views about those who are already in the business or considering buying one.

If you think you might want to start a stained glass business, then start slowly. Talk to your friends and relatives and start building windows for them in your spare time. Keep your day job! See how things work out. I would advise anyone thinking of going into any business, that before you make a decision to get into it, work for at least 3 months in the business, 90 days seems to be the point where you really get an eye opening. The honeymoon ends and you see what you're really getting yourself into. As you build windows for others, you'll get a feel for how the business works, what highs and lows there are. As you gain more practice building stained glass panels, you'll get better at the techniques and you'll learn how good you really are at it. You will be starting a stained glass studio at first instead of a stained glass business. After all, if the art doesn’t push you along, no amount of business will be enough to sustain you in your “hour of darkness.”

What usually happens is that you’ll discover what some of the frustrations of the business are. You will then be equipped to make a decision whether or not stained glass is the right business to try. I admit to people on a regular basis that I could make more money, more easily doing almost any other business than stained glass. It's true! And there have been times when I've gotten sick of stained glass. This is a truth! When you begin to do your hobby as a business, at some point it becomes work. I had reached that point when I met Milo, the student who drove me over the edge, http://www.gommstudios.com/stained-glass-articles/dont%20be%20milo.htm I really quit the business and couldn’t look at stained glass, even as a hobby, for over a year.

But, after all is said and done, there is another truth that leads many true artists to start their own business and that is that they love it! I’ve written articles about the joys and setbacks of the stained glass business at http://sglassguide.blogspot.com/ and there really are moments where it’s all worthwhile, that the struggle is worth it.

So I recommend that you give it a try, start slowly and test the waters. You don’t need to get a small business loan or sell the family heirlooms to raise capital. Just get a few hand tools, and maybe a grinder or a saw and start in your basement or garage, building a few pieces of glass.

If it gets frustrating, you may decide to bake bread or paint for a living. But if you find it to be a joy, then expand and expand till you are forced to break forth into a “real” business. Remember that you don’t need to start with business cards and licenses to begin. You simply begin to build one window and then another. Most stained glass artists I know started in exactly that same way. Good Luck!

How To Build A "Double Foam" Crate -Sept 2007

When a window arrived at a clients address, with a slight crack in the border glass, we were very glad that we had built the crate to specifications. The insurance on the parcel was more than enough to cover the replacement of the glass, but it is a nuisance to have to build or repair the glass and the customer is inconvenienced.

Read the whole article with pictures by clicking the title above.

How To We Crate Same Size Multiples of Glass -August 2007

There is a time when we need to ship several panels and a little more weight in one crate costs a lot less than shipping several different crates.

Here are three windows stacked up with 1" rigid foam on the top and bottom and thin bubble foam between each layer of glass.

Read the whole article with pictures by clicking the title above.

Running A Stained Glass Business In Provo, Utah

I have to confess that I don't know everything! This comes as quite a shock to myself, since I thought I knew everything for such a long time. I still have an opinion about everything; such is my confidence in my own ideas and judgments. But I just don't know everything!

I sometimes struggle with who to vote for like everyone else. And I stand amazed at the choices that some of my children make. Wow, I really never saw some of those things coming! But when it comes to stained glass, I feel pretty comfortable with my knowledge.

I can cut glass and design glass and solder panels, I have experience that spans several decades and in all that time I've picked up a substantial body of knowledge, but I still don't know everything. And that's a good thing! It's fun to learn and explore new techniques, it's exciting to try something new, that we've never done before, like sandblasting on both sides of a piece of glass that we just tried last week.

But what I really don't know is the minds of other people. Why don't they have the same intense love of stained glass that we do? What is missing in their lives that they don't feel inspired by really great images in glass?

Now that we've been located in Provo, Utah for eight years, we ought to be getting pretty good as to how our business needs to function in Provo. But we're just starting to scratch the surface. A few developers, architects and builders know who we are, but certainly not all. It's an extremely fun part of building and running a business to get to know new people in the industry who introduce us to new projects and opportunities. And it's gratifying when someone we've worked with in the past searches us out and presents work to us that is challenging. We love that part of the business.

What I really wish for is that others in the stained glass business would share their experience and knowledge with us so that we might all be able to help and lift one another. I think there is an unlimited supply of opportunity for any stained glass artist who wants it. I believe that the world is full of the need for more beauty and inspiration and that as stained glass artists we (as a community) have only touched the surface. Who doesn't need more beauty and inspiration in their life?

For more articles on stained glass visit http://www.gommstudios.com/stained-glass-articles/articles.htm

How To Install Stained Glass in an Existing Window Frame -July 2007

We often have requests for articles on how to install stained glass windows. It's hard to get enough pictures to do an article because we are usually in such a hurry to get the job completed that we don't take the time to take a lot of pictures.
But a month or two ago, we took our time on an install so we could get enough pictures to show how the install went.

We built three panels to fit into an existing framework. We were sure they would fit because we traced a paper pattern of the existing window openings and then made them a little smaller.

Read the whole article with pictures by clicking the title above.

Learning Precision

Back when I started doing stained glass, I didn’t quite understand the concept of precision in my work. I would cut out pieces of glass and for the most part they were close to what the pattern piece was. I would lay the pieces of glass out, one by one, on the print of the window and they would pretty much fit, but not quite. After I got all the pieces cut out, I would shift them together so that they fit tightly and then I would grind one or two pieces to fit into the space that was left for them.

The windows looked good and I was proud of them and I thought I was doing a good job. Then as years went by and I got better at the skill of cutting glass, I discovered that it just didn’t need to be so hard to finish a window. I learned to be more precise. I had always taught and practiced the art of cutting close to the line I had traced around the pattern piece. I had told students for years to cut on the inside of the line, right on that edge where the pattern piece and the marker touched each other so that the glass would perfectly match the pattern piece. And I noticed that my windows fit together better.

Then I became a true believer in precision. No longer did multiple curved pieces have to be slid about and adjusted. I could cut them out and be assured that they would fit perfectly, because each and every piece that I cut fit just that way. It matched the pattern piece and the layout plan. The mystery of how to shift the glass about was no longer needed because I had a new secret weapon, that of being precise.

In life, we often find times where precision is helpful. Like when following a recipe, it’s good to be fairly precise. Not perfect, we still don’t have to achieve perfection, to me precision is close enough. It’s going towards perfection but not getting goofy about it. I guess there are times where getting perfect would be great. Like perfect grades in a class that is important to us, or maybe trying to be perfectly loyal to friends and family or perfectly forgiving to those who wrong us. And when we fall short, I figure we can just reach for precision. To be “pretty good.”

Nowadays I try to teach students about being precise and often my words fall on deaf ears. It’s not that they ignore me, they just don’t understand what I mean. So when a student saves all her pieces to be ground at one time, I may give her a friendly word of advice, to grind as you go, cut each piece and then grind it so that everything fits as you go along. But if she doesn’t listen, I don’t worry. I know that in a day or two, when she starts to grind all those pieces to fit, she’ll echo the words of another student who said, “If I had known it was going to be so hard to grind these pieces, I would have tried to cut them closer to the line.”

Experience may be the best teacher of all!

For more articles on stained glass visit http://www.gommstudios.com/stained-glass-articles/articles.htm

How To Solder A Reinforcing Edge On A Curved Panel-June 2007

This is an edge panel that went with two other windows. You can see the entire piece installed by going to
http://www.gommstudios.com/stained-glass-gallery1/bailyhour/bailyhour.htm
The top edge of this piece is curved and we often get asked how we put 1/4" outer bar on curved pieces. It's very difficult to put outer bar on a piece which has a radius of less than 4'.

Read the whole article with pictures by clicking the title above.

How To Fix or Reinforce Glass With A Solder Bridge-May 2007

This is a panel that we built which had a weakness in a long thin section. We built several of them and they would sometimes crack at the thin point of the glass. So to keep that from happening and to reinforce the weak spot, we needed to reinforce the spot where the break was taking place.

The back of this piece is already repaired, you can see the bridged solder bead on the back of the panel.

Read the whole article with pictures by clicking the title above.

The Problem With Teaching Classes

I hope you’ll forgive me, but sometimes, I just need to blow off steam!!!

The other day some students from a nearby college called to say they’d like to stop by and discuss taking classes from us. Those who know us, know that we teach classes not to make money, but to get to know great people and rediscover the joys of stained glass. This was not such a meeting.

They showed up, very nice and agreeable and we took them to the studio where we had a very large project spread out and began discussing their desire to take a class, or rather the wife’s desire to take a class. She began to talk to Jeanne about taking classes and the husband, a young guy, in his twenties started talking to me. “Where do you get your glass from?” he wanted to know. I replied that we bought it from a wholesaler in another state and it came shipped to us by motor freight. “Does it come on a pallet, in a crate?” he further asked. I answered him but got a knot in my stomach, this was a weird question, quite out of the ordinary and not what the casual stained glass student would ask. He soon warned me, “You may not want to teach us about stained glass, because we plan to start a business making stained glass and we’ll be your competition.”

At that, I almost laughed out loud, because the idea of thinking you can go into the stained glass business is great in theory, but until you know the steps and the degree of difficulty that making stained glass pieces consist of, you just have no idea what you’re talking about! I attempted to give him some good advice, that he start small and begin by selling to friends so that he knows what he’s getting himself into before making a big splash in the stained glass business.

Then he told me how little he was interested in stained glass, how it was just a hobby his wife was interested in, how he had just started two other businesses and how he wondered if we could use an abrasive water jet machine to cut glass. I answered frankly that, yes we could, but that wasn’t the bottleneck in stained glass building, that foiling and, especially, soldering was. Then he began to theorize about how a machine could be built to do it for you and once again, I was struck by the lack of qualifications he had to be thinking this way. He had already admitted that he’d never soldered except some electronics work and he’d never welded. He really struck me as a gas-bag who had little real world experience, under qualified to do such a project, but at that arrogant stage where he thought he could do anything!

I did advise him that I could put him in touch with different people we know who are in the business and could give him pointers on how to get started, but he was never interested in hearing how other people are succeeding (or not succeeding) in the business. He was only interested in what he’d learned in school and his own arrogance about his ability to run a business. It bugged me, that as I told him stories of those we know in business and how things have worked for them, that he seemed to have the idea in the back of his head that, “this guy is a jerk, who just doesn’t know anything.” It was obvious that he had no respect for us, or our abilities or our years of experience.

My brother-in-law, Mike, advised me some years ago that I shouldn’t teach classes because it would only be training my competition. I disregarded that advice, not because I though it was without merit, but because I view the world in a different way. That- there is room enough for all to do what they want. There can be many stained glass artists employed in their profession and it doesn’t diminish us if we help another get a foothold. But where he’s right, is when some smart-assed punk, with no money, no experience and no artistic talent comes into my studio and thinks he can do a better job at the business which I’ve worked and failed and succeeded at for 35 years, that’s where having open doors of hospitality and openness may be a mistake!

Contrast that visit with the one we had the next week from a guy who wants to do stained glass as a hobby. He wanted to get all the tools he could easily afford, all the advice we could offer and whatever guidance we were willing to impart. He had read a book or two and had been studying glass work on the internet. He knew many of the terms that glass workers used and he seemed well grounded in embarking on the hobby. He wanted to try to do his first window on his own, with no instruction, just to test his own ability, but he was happy to get our video so he had the basics down before beginning. He had done his homework, was teachable in many areas and yet knew what he wanted. What a difference!

The only problem with teaching classes is that every student isn’t the golden contact we want to meet, some really drive us nuts and it’s often a balance between the best students whom we love and those few oddballs whom we’d rather bar the doors to keep them out.

How To Build A Window For A Backlit Space

To build a window to fit a backlit space, we first measure the space and draw the pattern. Then we cut off 1/4" all around so the piece will fit when it's completed.

We built the panel and left 1/4" of free space when we soldered it so that we could easily apply 1/4" zinc outer bar to the piece. (the 1/4" Strip fit's over the glass 1/8" and adds 1/8" so the panel is just the right size)

Read the whole article with pictures by clicking the title above.

How To Aggressively Reinforce A Window-Mar 2007

We try to encourage designs that are not only beautiful, but practical as well. Occasionally a client wants something that challenges us and we need to add additional reinforcing to strengthen the window. You may find yourself in a similar situation with a need to provide extra heavy reinforcement in just a line or two because the design just doesn't allow you to add lots of multiple lines of reinforcement. You may wan to try the following method to provide adequate reinforcement.

Read the whole article with pictures by clicking the title above.

Soldering A Zinc Edge On A Panel-Feb 2007

Many times we solder zinc 1/4" outer bar onto a window as a framework to strengthen it. Raw glass panels are usually very weak but adding zinc really increases their strength. Sometimes that zinc edge is the only framework that is used to hang the completed panel and sometimes the entire piece gets put inside a wooden framework to hang or stand as a room divider or in a window as a decorative element. Putting zinc on a window is a technique that all glass artists, both lead came and copper foil enthusiasts use. It is a basic skill that all flat glass artists need to learn.

Read the whole article with pictures by clicking the title above.

What Goals Does An Artist Set?

As I read and learn about how to run a business, I’m often confronted with the question, “What do you want to accomplish with your business?” Usually the article or speaker will go into depth and describe lofty goals of somehow creating an empire, a money machine, a legacy.

But those kinds of questions don’t seem to apply to us as artists. Our questions need to be, “What do you want to accomplish with your art?” We artists are often driven by visions, or desires that have little to do with the money or the details of running a business. We’re, instead, driven to create both for our audiences’ enjoyment and inspiration and for our own fulfillment.

So our goals are different than those of a businessman’s goals. But we have to set them, unless we ‘re happy with the way things are, we have enough income, enough fulfillment, enough challenge (and nothing ever changes in the future).

My problem is that there just isn’t enough room for glass in my home. I need to sell glass so that I can afford more and so there is a place to put it. And I need to set goals that will let others know about us and our accomplishments so they will trust our ability to do the job that they need done. And to be practical, I do want more equipment, not for the sake of ownership but for the ability to do more work.

I can cut glass with a hand cutter from the hardware store that costs a buck or two, but then I want an oil cutter that runs from $20 to $40. It improves my cuts, and my quality goes up. Then I need a strip cutter for straight lines and a circle cutter for, you got it, circles. And a saw would be nice and an extra grinder. And so it goes, another table, more storage space, just a little more so the quality can improve.

Stained glass is a very technical art form. Just ask anyone who’s ever done sandblasted pieces. There are so many things that must work properly. You need the right sand, the right nozzle, the right air pressure, and the right resist. The proper flow is achieved and you finally get to concentrate on the art. All those other details are just things that must be right in order to perform the art. This is why art competitions are so unfair to glass artists, judges hold us to the same standards as other artists even though the same conditions don’t apply. Painters don’t have to make their own paint and weave their own canvasses. Sculptors don’t have to quarry the stone out of the ground before starting work. Welders don’t have to start from scratch, creating metal from ore they dig out of the ground.

So, I’m beginning to set goals, artistic goals. The first is for myself. I want to work more hours on my art each week. This means I have to set more rigorous hours for myself. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve worked all day, and then all week and haven’t even cut a piece of glass. So I’m holding myself to a more structured in the shop work schedule.

Second, I like doing good work, the kind you have to go campaign for. Great work rarely comes knocking on your door, you have to go out and seek it. So I’ve set goals about a structured way to contact people. I’m not going to start knocking doors from sunup to sundown as I did when I sold books door to door, but I am going to talk to a couple of people every week.

Lastly, I’ve set some financial goals, nothing big and grandiose, just simple goals. Like, put some money in savings for a rainy day and then know how much profit I really make on a job. I don’t want to be like the two truck drivers who bought watermelons for a nickel apiece in Texas, drove them to New York and sold them for a nickel apiece. When they looked at how much they had made, one said to the other, “There’s no doubt about it, we’ve got to get a bigger truck!”

Goals don’t have to be big or unattainable. I think a lot of folks get put off by the idea of setting goals because they are so close to those New Years resolutions that get put off and failed at, year after year. But like someone said, “a goal that isn’t written down, is only a dream.” Dreams are great, they help me figure what my goals ought to be…..”I want to have a studio in the mountains near a babbling brook where little woodland animals…”

For more articles on stained glass visit http://www.gommstudios.com/stained-glass-articles/articles.htm

Cutting Diamonds On Very Rough Glass-Jan 2007

When building French style windows, you may need to cut many diamond shaped pieces and it would be tedious to draw around a pattern piece for each one. We came up with a system for cutting them quickly, which you may like to try. When we cut vecchio glass the challenge is even greater because of the roughness of the glass.

Read the whole article with pictures by clicking the title above.

Build A Solid Shipping Crate-Dec 2006

To ship a piece of glass, it needs to be crated and well protected. Knowing how to build a crate around every piece of glass which you ship is an important skill. It needs to be a custom fit so that the glass can be adequately protected. The following steps are of how we build a crate for an 18" by 30" window. We use the same techniques when crating bigger windows.

Read the whole article with pictures by clicking the title above.

Appreciating Stained Glass

In 1983 I opened a stained glass studio in the small town of Pierce City, Missouri. It was a small studio during the first few months and then I got a chance to purchase a large building for a really great price. I soon moved across the street into the new location and set up shop.

The town was a small town and there were several vacant business spaces, so residents were very interested in what we were doing. One day, an older fellow came into the shop, he was a tall thin fellow, dressed in farm clothing and slightly stooped over in the shoulders. I was standing at a bench, cutting glass to fit in an art glass panel. He looked around the shop with interest, reached out to touch some glass pliers hanging on a wall display and then asked, “What are you gonna’ do here,” in a slow drawl.

I sat my glass cutter down, wiped off my hands on a rag and replied that we built stained glass windows for people and we also taught classes on how to make stained glass.

He gave that information a moment to sink in. I could tell he was really thinking this over, his mind racing even though outwardly he appeared to be very calm and relaxed. “What do ya do whith it once you get it made?” was his next question.

My mind reeled at the question, I thought it was self evident what one would do with stained glass. “Oh, “ I calmly replied, ”You can hang it in a window so the sun can shine through it. Some people have installed it in the transoms over their doors and one lady even built a piece of glass as a room divider.”

The old man pondered this new information, he kept nodding his head and looking around, trying to take it all in, he wasn’t the type to make snap decisions or pass quick judgments. He was really thinking on what I’d said and what he’d seen, then he made a statement, “You can’t see through it.”

And that was true, you couldn’t see through the glass and in that man’s mind, a window was a thing that you looked through. No amount of conversation was going to change his mind, the only hope I had of demonstrating the value of stained glass was to show him something that he really liked. But the moment passed and he left, never understanding what we were really doing in our studio. I could hardly wait to get home and tell Jeanne about that man because it seemed so funny, so extraordinary to meet someone who just didn’t get it.

Now, with a few more years of experience under my belt, I look at that moment with different eyes. I think back to my teenage years, going to Sunday school with my friends where all the boys were excitedly discussing the different basketball games of the day before. I listened to all their words, all that excited discussion about the games and I tried to understand what was so exciting about them. I’d played the game in gym when I had to, I’d seen a game or two but I just didn’t get the connection. These were guys who were so enthusiastic about the game, they knew the stats of all the teams and many of the players. They knew the standings of the teams, who was going to the playoffs, who was going home. They thrived on the game, no detail was missed, no statistic too small to be uninteresting. And they loved to talk about the game, about the sport, about the contest, about their opinion how a team could be turned around.

But no matter how hard I listened, no matter how interested I tried to be, I just couldn’t understand the draw of the game, until I met a retired teacher who had taught basketball in high school. His name was Lou Dean Flake and he had moved to Missouri to retire. He had taught school in Wyoming and then in Arizona. What was fascinating to me was his description of the game of basketball. Coincidently, he had done some of his first teaching in the same school that my Dad was attending when he was in high school. He talked about how great it was to watch my dad play basketball. “He had the greatest, natural one handed shot of anyone I’ve ever seen,” he was fond of telling me. Imagine that, my Dad had been a great basketball player and as he had kids, not one of them had an interest in the game. But listening to Mr. Flake describe the games and the coaching he’d done, I got a glimpse of what could be so compelling.

I still don’t get it. I sit in a room with sports enthusiasts and feel like an outsider, but that’s okay. I appreciate passion and I feel good for them that they can find so much joy in the game, year after year. After all, I find joy in cutting little pieces of glass from big sheets and then putting the glass back together. I find joy in spending countless hours grinding and fitting and learning every detail I can about stained glass. I’ll bet a lot of those ball players would shake their heads in wonder at how anybody could find it all so interesting, after all, “You can’t see through it.”

For more articles on stained glass visit http://www.gommstudios.com/stained-glass-articles/articles.htm

Nov-How To Clean A Really Dirty Window

Once, I left a window to be cleaned for over a month. It was made with clear artique glass, so all imperfections showed up and the flux that had sat on the panel left the glass looking cloudy after a normal cleaning. I was really worried because I had done this to several windows and faced having to build them all again from scratch. Flux should be cleaned off of a window as soon as possible to avoid this problem.

Read the whole article with pictures by clicking the title above.

Oct-How To Clean And Apply Patina

Okay, it's not brain surgery, it doesn't even sound that complicated, but if you follow these steps, you'll have success when applying patina, and if you don't, you'll end up with very mixed results.

Read the whole article with pictures by clicking the title above.

Build Your Own Work Bench-Sept 2006

1. Start with the top frame which is made of 2 sets of two by fours, 2-48” long and 2-33” long. The total dimension of the top frame will measure 48” x 36” when screwed together. Use glue at the joints and run two 3-1/2” deck screws in the long 2 x 4’s at each end to join them to the shorter boards. (Some folks like to add additional strength to the table by adding an additional short board in the middle of the frame, but this is not necessary).
Build 2 of these frames at the same time, the second will serve as the footrest and bracing for the legs.

2. Next, screw the 48” x 36”, ¾” (or ½”) particle board top to the top frame (you may substitute with plywood if desired). You may want to just use screws (no glue) to attach the table top to the frame so that it will be easy to replace it if you ever need to. Screws to attach the top should be spaced 6” apart and be at least 1-1/2” in length.

3. Next, turn the table top upside down and attach the 4 32-1/2” legs to the table top. The boards should rest inside the framework and touch the underside of the table top. 3-1/2” screws should be used to attach the legs and they should be run into the legs from both directions.

4. Before turning the table over, measure down on the legs 8” and attach the extra frame work you built in step 1. When you turn the table over, the top of the frame will be 11-1/2” from the floor, a good height to be able to use as a footrest and to be able to sweep under.
Some folks like to add a shelf to the top of the foot rest for storing light objects. This is best done when the table is turned over. Also, a ¾ thick x 1-1/2” wide cleat added to one side of the workbench will give you a good way to use a strip cutter.

Bill Of Materials
6 – 2 x 4 x 8’
1 – ¾ x 3’ x 4’ particle board or plywood
3-1/2” Deck Screws
1” or longer screws for top attachment
Glue
Optional – ¾ x 1-1/2” choice lumber for cleat
Cut List
4 – Long Frame Pieces – 48”
4 – Short Frame Pieces – 33”
4 – Legs – 32-1/2”
1 – ¾ x 3’ x 4’ particle board or plywood

I hope you enjoy using your workbench.

Read the whole article with pictures by clicking the title above.

The Business Dream

Sometimes, it’s just great to be in business! I step back for a moment, the floor is swept clean, a cool breeze runs through the studio, the finishing touches have been made on a big project which is ready to deliver and the bills have been paid for the month!

It’s a rare occasion, but there really are times when all the hectic hustle and bustle of commerce and deadlines fade away and you’re able to find the calm, like a mountain stream, carrying all your cares away. And it’s good! Good to be in control of your destiny! Good to be earning your way, doing what you set out to do, building a team of folks you can depend on.

Back when I was truck driving as a way to pay the bills, I often had occasion to overhear different business people complaining about the stress of running a business and I just plain didn’t believe a word they said! I would listen to women with big fat diamonds on both hands complaining about how hard it was to make ends meet and I just couldn’t take them seriously. Men who had gotten so fat that there was no way they could really put in a hard day of labor would talk about how hard they worked and it was all I could do to keep from laughing.

So I got the itch to go into business for myself and let it take me into the great adventure! The idea of all that freedom to do what I wanted, was like a drug, a siren song calling to me to come and enjoy the fruits of the goodness of the earth. It was like walking off a cliff, starting into business. You think you know what you’re getting into, but nothing prepares you for ALL that. You’re in charge, it’s great! Then you realize that you’re in charge of everything!

It’s probably best to start your own business when you’re young, when you have unlimited reserves of energy and no doubts that you’ll succeed. Old duffers know too much, have seen too many ways to lose the game. I was in business when I was young and then somehow got the crazy notion that I should go to college and become a professional. Then, for several years, I enjoyed telling my boss that I didn’t want to go into business for myself each week when he was sweating finding enough to pay the payroll. “Did I ever tell you that I don’t want to be in business for myself,” I told him at least once a week for years. I was rather smug about it.

Then something happened. I just knew I had to do it. I had to go into business for myself, take back the control I’d given to others and see where it took me. I’d been in business full time years ago. I knew something about the stained glass business and had been building windows as a part time business for years. But somehow, the urge was strong to get back into the business full time. What was wrong with me? I was older, I knew better, but I did it anyhow! I went into business again!

Back in the eighties, I had never really figured out how to make it in the stained glass business, I had simply discovered a way to make a good living as I created several video rental stores. It was fun, it was exciting, it was the best time! And I would find myself explaining to employees that it was really difficult to make ends meet. And they would look at me with doubt in their eyes, not believing a word I said.

So, here we are. Jeanne and I are working together full time in our business and we’re not getting rich. We just kind of keep our heads above water. But the quality of our lives is so good. You can deal with a lot of tough times when they are offset by the chance to meet really great people and get to design works of art that we would have never dreamed of in years past. And the more we do, the more open we become to bigger and better designs, more and more substantial projects.

And sometimes the floor gets swept and the weather turns cool and nothing could be sweeter than stepping into the studio and hearing the crisp scratch of the glass cutter as I score yet another piece of glass for an elegant piece of art.

August-Reinforcing A Large Panel

We recommend that windows which exceed 3' by 4' in size be reinforced to prevent breakage. If a window is 3' by 3', it might not need to be reinforced, that's usually a judgment call based on where it is to be installed.

In the old days, when a panel was large and needed to be reinforced, artists actually installed big pieces of rebar, no kidding rebar, in window frames and wired the stained glass to the rebar. This was an effective method of reinforcement, but it was far from attractive.

Read the whole article with pictures by clicking the title above.

July-Insulating Stained Glass To Be Installed In A Door

Tempered glass needs to surround decorative glass used in a door. This protects people from injury if the glass is broken and it also serves as a barrier against heat loss during cold months. Tempered glass must be ordered in advance and once its been tempered, it can't be cut or ground.


Read the whole article with pictures by clicking the title above.

Just Too Happy For Words

The other day a client came to pick up a window we built for her. She took one look at it and broke into tears. Yes, it really was that beautiful, a real knockout of design. Most people don't burst into tears over the beauty of their window, that comes later on an overcast day, when they are in a mood and they walk in to see those vibrant colors that somehow draw emotion out of you, forcing you to pay attention.

Stained glass art does that, it draws out emotions, demands recognition. There was a painting that some friends of mine owned. It was a macro-realistic painting of strawberries with a drop of water on one of the leaves and it was so perfect and so big, it took me away. It made me feel that I was a fraud, that my art meant nothing compared to this perfect still-life. It didn't actually make me weep to view that beauty, but it did bring me to the brink of tears (it's a guy thing, I guess).

I feel sorry for those who never develop a sensitivity to art work. Like the fellow in Missouri who asked what you did with that there stained glass when you were done with it. I carefully explained that we put it in the window and enjoyed the way it looked. He nodded his head for a long time and then said, "But you can't see through it."

He was right, you often can't see through a piece of stained glass, but, Oh the joy of looking at it, instead of through it. The Father of the client picking up the window really tried to understand his daughters connection to the piece of glass. "You really like that, don't you? Can you tell me what it is about it that you like? She answered and he still kept asking, not understanding the beauty that she beheld.

I'm glad to be one of those who gets it when viewing a piece of glass, and a great painting, a good view and a great sunset. Maybe I need to find common ground with guys who don’t get glass, I’m sure they swell with pride when they look at their dog or maybe their new truck…

When Is Enough Enough?

There are times when I really wonder what I should do. Like the time that a window was broken by a friend who installed it as a favor to a customer. Do I have a responsibility because I knew them? Where does my involvement start and end? I mean, I want to be a good guy, but I'm also in business to make a profit, not to lose money.

To resolve the issue in my own mind, I think about the way that Randy Meitler, a metal artist reacts when things go wrong. (www.meitlermetalworks.com) Randy bends over backwards to satisfy the client. He often goes and does work for a client when he had little or nothing to do with a problem. I have seen him lose money time after time, fixing problems that others caused. When he installed a gate according to the instructions that the firm who hired him gave him, it didn't work right. Those guys didn't engineer the project properly. Really, Randy wasn't at fault, but he came out and re hung different hinges which had less friction in them and the gate worked fine. By rights, he should have been able to charge for the extra work, since it was the other guys fault, but he didn't. When I asked him about it, he explained that he would rather feel good about the job than to haggle over right and wrong and have the client have bad feelings.

He believes that what you do, comes back in some form. If you give good service, you'll get repeat business. If you give poor service, people will know.

There was a mechanic in the town where we lived in Missouri. He was an excellent mechanic, but he always had to cut himself a little better deal. When you took your car in for a tune-up or inspection, he always recommended that you get a new starter because that old one was going bad. If you happened to need a new starter, he was sure to find that your battery was bad as well. He padded every job with as much as he could and as a result, over the years, folks quit coming to him. He was still an excellent mechanic, but he had milked so many jobs that his reputation caught up with him and he lost more business that he gained.

So what am I going to do when asked to make good on a deal that has already cost me dearly? I'm going to remember what my son told me in a recent conversation. "It's not that the customer is always right, they're wrong as often as not, but we treat them with the same respect and care as IF THEY WERE RIGHT."

For more articles on stained glass visit http://www.gommstudios.com/stained-glass-articles/articles.htm

June-Removing Corrosion From Stained Glass

Sometimes we find that the metal surrounding a piece of glass begins to corrode. It is quite easy to remedy the problem. Some folks in the chemical industry refer to this white powder as "mold", but I believe they are mistaken. Mold doesn't grow as fast as I've seen some oxidation take place.


Read the whole article with pictures by clicking the title above.

May-Re Applying Patina To A Stained Glass Panel

Here is a panel that is in need of brightening. The blackness of the patina is dull and you can see that there is a buildup of pale corrosion around the edges of the lead lines.



Read the whole article with pictures by clicking the title above.

Competition Is Only An Illusion

It's important that we as stained glass artists realize that we are not in competition with each other. There is a tendency to see someone else’s success and feel jealous. “I should have gotten that commission, I could have done better.” We see artists in all mediums belittling their colleagues work. What’s wrong with us? Are we working from an attitude of scarcity or abundance? Those who have a view of life that there exists abundance become much more open and able to feel joy for the success of others. They are able to be inspired by the work of others instead of feeling jealous.

When I started in stained glass in 1983, I wasn't making enough to support us by only doing glass. Somehow, I stumbled onto video rentals and soon I had three video rental stores in three different towns. What's interesting is that in one town, another person opened a video rental store right behind ours on the same block. We thought we were really going to be in fierce competition.

The other store lasted a year and then the owner relocated to another town. During that year, the store located in the town with the “competitor” did about $1200 in rentals each week, so did the store in a nearby town that had no competition. After the other store closed down, our revenues went up for a week or so, but leveled back to about $1200 a week. If that other guy was so much competition, shouldn’t the stores’ revenues have doubled when he closed? Hmmm.

Later, three other video stores opened in the town where there was no competition. Guess what? There was very little change in that stores receipts. There was a slight dip in the stores revenues, but not anywhere near enough to hurt us. Huh, that just didn’t seem right.

A couple of years ago, a major stained glass studio in Salt Lake City, Utah closed their doors. We sell stained glass in Salt Lake through a couple of decorators and are located about 50 miles south of there. If it were true that we were in competition with each other, my business would have gone up. But it didn’t, what another store does has very little effect on us. Except that if someone starts a heavy advertising campaign, interest in stained glass goes up and it’s almost as if their campaign was one of our own. So having people around in the same business only SEEMS like you’re in competition. Their marketing efforts help me!

Recently, our studio worked with two other “competitors” on a project. We were contacted to build some large windows to go in doors in an office building. They would have to be insulated between tempered glass and rather than use the local big glass guys who routinely make mistakes and even damage windows, we approached our nearest competitors, a stained glass shop who have been in business for many years. They turned out to be very friendly and helpful and even though the price for their work was 50% higher than that other glass shop, the value was there because they treated our work as if it was their own.

When I asked if they could install the glass, they were too busy, but they recommended another glass company who specializes in installations. The install went so well, that we’ve asked for other help from that third company.

So instead of being “competitors”, by using each others talents and strengths, it’s almost like we’re partners. The glass shop that did the insulated units doesn’t teach classes, so they give out our business cards to people who ask about classes and they send folks to us when they don’t have a specific piece of glass in stock.

Your natural instinct may be that if my students go buy tools from a different glass studio, I’m losing money, but don’t forget that the folks at the other studio are coming to you and making purchases. It’s a win-win situation. You and your neighbor studio sell more to each others students because they visit and everything in your studio looks new, because they haven’t been there before. The students win, because they get to see the same things in a different setting and it breathes new life into their hobby.

What if they start building windows for their friends and become competitors? Then treat them like partners, like long lost friends. Their circle of influence is completely different than yours and so it doesn’t matter if they are selling to others, they were never going to be your customers anyhow. And besides that, the more people who learn about stained glass in your area, the more popular it will become. And the more educated the community is about glass, the more valued it will become.

Have you ever wondered why all the car lots seem to cluster together? They all seen to locate on a single road, rows of them. Because they know that there is power in numbers. That they aren’t really in competition with one another. By locating closely to each other, they create a synergy where the two separate lots might have sold a number of cars by themselves, but by being near each other, they’ll each sell more than they would have.

Get over the jealousy and you can really enjoy your business. The other store owners will become your best friends instead of your enemies. Sounds good? Try it.

For more articles on stained glass visit http://www.gommstudios.com/stained-glass-articles/articles.htm

Dragging Myself Out Of Depression

I have been cursed with depression most of my adult life. I especially remember that my bouts of depression would center around the delivery cycle of The Mother Earth News magazine. It came every two months and I would read it from cover to cover and then, usually fall into a blue period which would sometimes turn into depression. I figured that it was because the magazine caused me to dream of freedom and a different lifestyle which was very different from the one I was living. I didn’t feel there was a way to live the life I longed for, that I was stuck, so I became depressed.

As time went on, I noticed that when I was under a lot of stress, my depression cycle deepened. When I sold books door to door, the job was very stressful and I would be able to work at selling for two weeks and then each third week, I would be unable to face the world and stayed in bed for a week. Then I would feel ready to face things again, sell for another two weeks and retreat to sleep for another week. This was not a healthy cycle, it really put a strain on relationships with others. I was lucky that Jeanne was able to cope with my ups and downs.

When I faced a crisis of sorts about the age of 28 and irrationally moved to Missouri without any job or prospects (following the Mother Earth News lifestyle) I found that depression left me for a long period of time. My stress levels were lower, and I was living a life that was closer to the one I desired. My cycle was still there, I still had a tendency to get a little down, but it was dip in my mood, rather than a full depression. So I had a few pretty good years. I started a stained glass business and rented videos from the three stores I started, things were pretty good.

Then I made some “responsible” choices, going to college and joining the regular workforce and slowly my depression cycle returned. I think the cycle is a naturally occurring ebb and flow that we all have and that the deep depression was my subconscious minds’ way of trying to deal with life choices it didn’t agree with. As I struggled with employment issues and dealing with teenaged children my depression really became a monster that sometimes completely stopped me in my tracks. I would find myself unable to do the simplest tasks. I began visiting a depression treatment center, encouraged by a councilor to figure out what was wrong so that I could be over this once and for all. That was one of the worst times of my life, because I had no way to get out of the cycle of depression. I wasn’t working, so didn’t get that positive lift to my ego. The medications seemed to do little to help. And the kids weren’t making life any easier.

Eventually, I just went back to work and forgot all the depression center nonsense and my mood immediately rose. They say men derive self esteem from work and women derive self esteem from their relationships. That may be true because I certainly began to feel better being back at work. Still the cycle continued, at least I found that anytime I got a cold, I stayed sick longer than normal. A cold that would cause a normal person to miss a day of work would knock me out for a week. This effects your reputation at work and has a negative impact on your career. I began to suspect that I might have allergies that were causing me to be physically overwhelmed and thereby affecting my mental state.

Good theory, but when I finally learned that I had type 2 diabetes (in 2003) I finally understood why I had these lingering illnesses. Diabetics typically have symptoms three times longer than others. Their systems abilities to fight off colds and flu are less, so they need to be careful to avoid sickness. And being sick opens the door to depression, mental states are lower and your ability to cope goes down when you feel helpless.

My depression cycle still continued, but since I knew why I was unable to give good consistent work to an employer, I determined to go back to stained glass full time. It had been part time from the day I sold my business back in 1984, now it’s full time again. One of the benefits of being self employed is that if I’m having a bad day, I can go to work later. I can adjust my work hours to go along with how I’m feeling. Some days I’m only up to 3 or 4 hours of work and some days I’m up to putting in 10 or 12 hours of work. Depression is not as much of an issue any longer because I’m doing what I love and so my stress levels are at a level I can handle.

But occasionally, the monster of the “artistic temperament” raises its’ head and I have to deal with it. I have found a few ways of coping with depression over the years.

First, when you find yourself getting down, try to look inside and see what is causing the additional stress. Getting down is normal, it’s when you start to not be able to deal with it that you have a problem, so look inside and see what’s going on. Are you facing moral issues that weigh heavily on you? Is your life not tracking where you want it to? What is it that seems to be trapping you? Once you find your answers, you can begin to dream of ways to bring your life back into control, which will lessen your feelings of helplessness. It may be something as simple as starting a savings account for a vacation that you want to take, or starting a plan to get out of debt. Your problems won’t disappear, but your attitude towards them will make them feel less threatening.

Second, make sure that the little voice in your head is positive and not negative. Write yourself a little commercial that you read to yourself everyday and throughout the day. It should be positive and state what a winner you are and how successful you are, it should reflect your dreams and state them as if they are already a reality. This little recitation to yourself will turn away the negative that can grind you down and allow you to get to a place where you can handle things again. When I can’t work up the energy to even read my affirmation, I sing a little song which I made up (patterned on one they taught when I was selling):

It’s a great day to be a glass man,
Best Thing I know,
It’s a great day to be a glass man,
Everywhere I go, go, go, go
Cut my own pieces,
Put them back together,
It’s a great, great day to be a glass man,
No matter what the weather.

It’s a very dopey song, but I find that no matter how down I am, I can mumble this and it raises my attitude enough to croak it and then to sing it and then to believe it. And if I believe I’m happy, then I am.

Third, and most important, I have to let God into my life. When I’m down, I don’t believe in anything, not God and not Jeanne and not my own abilities. But if I can open up just a little and talk to God and ask for help, he always helps in some way. He didn’t give us life so we can suffer, we’re here to have joy and get out of ourselves and look around us and see the good in life and enjoy it and see the suffering around us and reach out to help relieve that suffering that others are experiencing.

Depression is a natural event, in my life anyway. So I figure it must be a natural event in your life as well. It’s neither good or bad, it just is. How we deal with it, that’s what determines the difference between those whose lives work and those whose lives don’t work.

Artists Learn To Live With Disappointment, How To Lessen The Impact Of Setbacks

One of the realities of being an artist is that we take risks with our art and often fail in the process. Sometimes things go wrong with the techniques we are using and sometimes we bring failure on ourselves. We imagine making a beautiful piece that will only take a few minutes, which we begin and it ends up taking weeks. Our studio has many projects in the half-finished stage. We had planned to finish that project right away, but it took more time and as we let time pass, the project takes even longer.

We started one project and jumped right in and cut all the glass for one third of a three panel window. It only took a couple of days. Then we got side tracked by another job with a more pressing deadline. We set the three panel project aside and worked on the new project. Then another project was ordered. It was a couple of months by the time we got back to the three panel project. We had to get it out of storage and clean off all the dust that had gathered on it. Then we started foiling it. There were a couple of pieces that needed to be fixed and we had to research what the colors were supposed to be because by that time, we’d forgotten a lot of the details of the window. We got the thing foiled and then soldered one side of the panel and ran out of time. We had to complete another project, so once again, the three panel project went back into storage. When we got back to it, it needed to be cleaned again, which used up valuable time. And something was happening to us mentally, since we had put off the project so long, we found it easy to put off again. We struggled with color choices, cleanliness issues and direction that “grain” should run through the window, all things that take care of themselves when we complete a window in a timely manner. Finally we just stayed on to the end and completed the panel. It was easy once we dedicated ourselves to the task.

When we started experimenting with hot glass and firing plates in our kiln, we struggled for a long time. We would fire a piece of glass for use on a plate and get bubbles in it and that would be a setback. We’d have to study to figure out what happened and then overcome the fear of failure enough to try another piece. Then we would fire a piece and it would be perfect except for the fact that it broke. Time after time, we experimented with temperatures and glass mixes. And with each failure, we learned more, but we had to fight to continue to try again and again.

Finally, there is the type of failure and disaster that comes in our art by just plain dumb luck, (bad luck). You’re just finishing a panel, nailing on the outer metal to a piece of glass and your hammer slips and breaks a piece of the panel. It’s really no big deal, but now you have to de-solder the piece of glass, cut a new one and solder it in, just to get back to where you were before the mistake happened. This type of accident happens occasionally and isn’t too hard to recover from. It’s the other mishaps that occur that are especially difficult to deal with. When a glass insulator or installer breaks a piece of glass for you, it’s tough to deal with, especially when you hand carried it to them, warned them of weaknesses and begged them to be careful. The worst accidental break is when you don’t tie down the load securely enough or someone trips on an install, or any number of accidents that end up with severe damage. You may just want to go to bed for a week and fins a nice comfortable job in a pillow factory.

So what do we do to fight against despair?

In the first place, determine that once you start a project, you’ll finish it right away. Plan ahead so you’ll be sure to have the time to complete the work in your schedule, then start the work and stay with it till it’s done. This will save so much time in the long run that it will become even easier to stay on schedule because you’ll be saving all that time doing steps over and over again.

Second, when you start learning a new technique or process, take a class. We could have saved ourselves a lot of time and failure by enrolling in a class with a qualified instructor and learning some of the pitfalls to avoid. Instead, we tried to learn by reading a book and doing it on our own.

Third, attack any problem head on. If you break a piece of glass, fix it immediately. If it breaks again, fix it again. Leaving it till later will only make it worse. And when the damage is really bad, try to assess which method you’ll use to repair the damage. Will you fix the broken pieces or rebuild the whole thing? We once spent a month and a half repairing a window, which only took two weeks to build in the first place. We would have been time and materials ahead to have just started over on that project, not to mention the fact that it meant we had to suffer five weeks with our mistake rather than two.

My students sometime tire from hearing me say that “the difference between an amateur and a professional is that a professional will fix their mistakes.” If that’s true, and I believe it is, a true professional will also fix their mistakes quickly.

For more articles on stained glass visit http://www.gommstudios.com/stained-glass-articles/articles.htm

April-Studio Chemicals

After covering repair techniques over the last few newsletters, I thought it might be helpful to go over the chemicals we use in the studio and their uses.

We use many chemicals in the stained glass studio. It's sometimes helpful to review how they are best used and when they should be used. This helps us achieve better (and safer) results.

Read the whole article with pictures by clicking the title above.

How Can I Make It In The Stained Glass Business?

I wrote this entry in response to a query from a businessman who is thinking about buying an existing stained glass business. He asked if I thought it was a good idea. When a person first embarks on starting into business, there is a tendency to be overly optimistic, so I felt it important to warn of the pitfalls he may encounter. I have to admit that when I re-read this blog page, I felt it was almost too honest, that it leaves me feeling a little vulnerable, like I've told too much.

Recently, one of the best stained glass supply and teaching centers in Salt Lake City, closed their doors. They were very aggressive and well run. They had been in business for over fifteen years (I don't know how long their actual years of operation were). Why did they fail? What was new? Two years previously, the long time run business was sold by the original owner who wanted to retire to a man who had made enough money for the purchase running a janitorial business. But the stained glass business is different than any other business. I have often said that I could probably make more money and be more successful in ANY OTHER BUSINESS that I chose to run. That recent business closure illustrates the fact that the stained glass business is very competitive and labor intensive.

When we started in the stained glass business in 1983, I soon discovered that the business was a real roller-coaster. Cash flow would go from nil to a modest influx of cash about every three months. When we sold a window or commission we would have enough cash to get another order of materials together. We never really felt we were making money, it felt that we were just using up supplies and then replenishing. I found that running a stained glass only business was very tough and discovered that by changing my business into a stained glass/video rental business worked much better. Eventually we ended up with 3 video rental stores which did quite well. (that would not be the case in today's market).

We quit doing stained glass as a living in the late 80's, but continued to do commissions and personal work in our spare time. This is an avenue that I recommend to students who think it might be fun to get into the business. This way they can test the waters and find whether they really want to expand into the business of glasswork. Most find that doing a little on the side is the perfect avenue for them.

I started back into the stained glass business, full time again, 5 years ago (1999) when I moved to Utah. My son thought the market here would be better than it had been in Missouri. While it is true that I'm able to sell more glass here, I find the increased rental prices for a store location to be a barrier that equalizes things to be about the same as Missouri.

So you may ask me, why are you working at stained glass if things are so difficult and I would answer that if I weren't stricken by diabetes, I would probably be working in a different industry. Since I have health problems, I had to go into business for myself since I can't be a dependable employee. I already knew the stained glass business and had stained glass ability. So I went into it again. It is tough, and rewarding but not so much in a financial sense but on an artistic level. I beat my head against the wall trying to figure how to make a living, but simply seem to scrape by each year. So far, in five years of internet presence, we have worked and worked on our site and not yet made a single sale from the site. (We have picked up the majority of our students from our website and have met many in the business from publishing our newsletter.) We have changed our product line, rewritten pages and registered with search engines. I have finally asked a designer to help me and offer him a percentage of all sales he makes. Maybe that will pay off.

We do make a small amount of money by offering stained glass classes. But after taking all expenses and costs into account, we find that we just break even on classes. If I made enough money to support myself well in this business, I would take the extra money and expand and hire help, but so far I'm just keeping my head above water. It is my belief that the key to making it in stained glass is to offer products that will help others to enhance their stained glass experience. I would advise you, that before you make a decision to get into the business to work for at least 3 months in the business, 90 days seems to be the point where you really get an eye opening. The honeymoon ends and you see what you're really getting yourself into.

Be very cautious about the valuation of the business that you are looking to purchase. Remember that you are looking at retail values versus the wholesale values of the business. Figure that the cost of buying all materials and starting a business from scratch is 1/3 to 1/4 of the retail value of the business. It is rare to find that an existing business really has a built up value of customer good will which has much, if any, value to the potential new owner. Customers are our friends and we love them, but because most people only have a limited interest in the business, their value to future income is smaller than the seller might lead you to believe.

It is true that warm glass has more to offer in a studio setting than just flat glass work, but look at the root of the matter. The stained glass industry knows that they are working with a craft which is fleeting. The normal student has one to three projects in them and then they are done. By expanding into warm glass, we are able to offer a wider range of techniques and projects which helps to hold the students interest longer. But what we've done is change a three month customer into a 6 month customer. We still face a huge attrition rate. Being a lover of glass work, I am often shocked at the number of students who start class and then drop out without even finishing their project.

When I talk to other businesses, I often ask if they will furnish me a copy of their business plan. I hope to learn from those plans ways that I might be able to find more success in my own business. If you come up with a business plan, I'd love to see a copy of it.

One word of encouragement, people in the business are in two camps. There are those who are secretive and afraid that you might want to steal their ideas. But the vast majority of business owners in stained glass are open and willing to share their knowledge and advice. They are those who realize that there really isn't any competition in the business. That shop down the corner doesn't create competition, they increase the knowledge and appreciation of stained glass in the community, so they actually help your business rather than hurting it.

Send me contact information and I'll put you on my newsletter mailing list. I hope my comments are enlightening.

For more articles on stained glass visit http://www.gommstudios.com/stained-glass-articles/articles.htm

For our newletter archives visit http://www.betterstainedglass.com/Newsletter/Archives/newsletterarchiveindex.htm