Welcome to My Journey in Glass!

A life in glass by Wm. Austin Norvell

'I fell in love with glass the first time I was introduced to the magical material.'

Wm. Austin Norvell

Artist, Glassworker, Founder of Melt Glass Charleston

Through this blog I hope to share my journey in glass, as well as share the possibilities with glass, my mission with Melt Glass Charleston, our services and some unique glass artwork available through our shop.

In the beginning...

I had always done artsy things growing up. I was big into black and white photography, papermaking, working with clay, and building things with wood. Growing up in Charleston, I took weekly art classes at the Gibbes Museum of Art and through local artists. I spent every summer at Storefront School of the Arts, where I learned pretty much every artistic material, and I even had the wonderful opportunity of taking music and dance (this style of dance was a little different from cotillion which i was unfortunately accustomed to). Storefront was held at random venues throughout Charleston every summer. One year it was in the vacant Condon's building on King Street. One particularly warm year, it was held in a circus tent in the middle of Hampton Park. I was able to experiment with every material out there, except glass. I'm still intrigued by all other materials. I continued to work with everything from wood to clay to steel. But now I use these other materials to form glass.

I went to college in England, where I was introduced to mold making for ceramics. Then I returned back to Charleston to finish up at CofC where I got into metalworking and mold making for hot metals. After college, I continued mold making for various materials in my own little studio in Mount Pleasant, while I was making pizzas to get by. And then a family friend told me about Penland School of Craft in North Carolina. I saw the summer program and found the one material I had never had access to before. I signed up for a workshop using a process, mold making, which I had been using for a few years. Glass Casting. This is where it all started.

From the moment I walked into the glass studio at Penland, I fell in love. The smell of hot glass hitting wet wooden tools, the sound of glass popping everywhere and the furnaces that melted the glass, the sight of the inside of the furnaces, almost too blinding to look at. Almost. It was all completely new to me, except for the mold making part, where I almost felt at home. The instructor of that workshop was Daniel Clayman. It was incredible for me to see what glass could do through his large, complex molds. During that workshop, I was even able to scoop molten glass out of the furnace into a mold. I remember reaching in the furnace, which I now know was at about 2350 degrees F. I had no fear. I reached in, which felt like it was up to my elbows, and I believe it was. I scooped out a huge ladle of the fluid material. In that second, I fell in love with hot glass and also burned through a pair of Kevlar gloves, which I now know cost about 300 dollars for a pair. The objects I made during that workshop in the mountains were insignificant, but the experience changed the course of my life.

Dan asked us to bring a few objects to assist in learning the process. I brought a wooden object I had turned on my lathe, an object I made in clay, and I picked up a rubber duck at a thrift shop on the way up the mountain. That rubber duck would be the first thing I ever cast in glass. I made two. One is in a box in storage. The other crystal rubber duck is still on my dad's desk 22 years later.

The week following that workshop at Penland, I ordered a glass casting kiln and set up my studio to start working with glass. I had lots of notes and plenty of mold reciopes andkiln schedules that I really didn't understand just yet. I experimented with cast glass for several years, while I was still making pizzas. I still have several boxes of failed experiments from that time. I think my success rate was about 5 percent.

A few years later, I would rent the glass casting studio during the snowy winter at Penland. I worked alone on some weird cast glass projects, while Martin Janecky and Jonathon Capps were making some really cool hot glass in the hot shop. One day, I played on the torch with flameworked borosilicate glass. Martin came in and showed me how to make a little encased fish. I still have that. I remember spending a lot of time warming up while watching and smelling the hot glass being shaped. Watching hot glass will never get old to me. I still do it every chance I get, in friends' studios, at glass conferences, at the glass furnace next to the casting studio I work in in Italy. Any chance I get.

Several years after that first introduction, I would rent a log cabin on the back of Penland Mountain. For 5 years, I would take glass workshops, work with glass artists in the community, experiment with all types of glass, and visit Penland weekly if not daily to see who was teaching and what they were making in the glass studio.

Anyways, I've loved the material in all forms ever since Penland. And for the last twenty years, I've been working with glass and visiting Penland.

For someone who wants to learn about glass, I would suggest taking a class at Penland School of Crafts in North Carolina.

For a quicker local introduction to cast glass, I'm offering private, personalized workshops.

Sign up now for a Glass Casting Workshop