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FAQ's What is frit? TOP
Frit simply is tiny shattered or broken pieces of glass that have been sorted by particle size. Glass frit is most commonly used in lampworking, glassblowing, fusing & slumping. What is Furnace Glass? TOP
Furnace blown glass is typically soda-lime glass (glass which is composed mainly of soda, lime and sand). This glass is commonly referred to as "soft glass" because it has a lower melting point and a longer working range. Furnace blown glasses are also more saturated with color due to it's being used for glassblowing. To read more in detail about furnace blown glass, Val Cox has quite an informative section in her book "Frit Secrets."
Some manufacturers of furnace glass include Gaffer, Kugler, Loetz, Reichenbach & Zimmerman. When can I expect my frit? TOP
I ship packages every Tuesday and Friday except when I'm on call. The weeks that I'm taking hospital call I ship Saturdays (my call schedule can be found in the event calendar). How do I use Copper Cutouts? TOP
The copper butterflies are a great way to make butterfly beads for the sculpturally challenged (like me :) ) You can do the same thing with thin copper leaf, but it burns off. The thick copper foil won't burn off if you keep it in the cool part of the flame.
1. Make your base bead - whatever shape you like - but you will encase this after the copper is applied so keep size in mind.
2. Apply whatever frit, stringer, etc to the base and melt in - this is totally up to you - whatever you want!
3. Heat a small area of the base bead in the flame - about the size of the copper piece that you wish to apply.
4. Apply the copper piece by either placing it on the hot spot with tweezers or picking it up off of a marver with the bead directly.
5. Marver the copper piece flush.
6. Encase with transparent glass of choice (Clear glass will turn the copper piece red!!!)
7. Reshape to desired finished shape!
Why did the prices change and how did I price the frits? TOP
I haven't changed my prices since opening my store in 2008, and finally needed to look at what I was charging for two reasons: first, I would like to remain in business so as to be able to continue to be able to meet your frit needs and second: I discovered that I was undercutting some of the competing frit vendors by a substantial amount, possibly damaging their businesses.
I went through each color and broke the frit down by ounce and added the jar and the initial shipping to me. Then I compared the price to other vendors to make sure that it was competitive.
After doing research on frit blend prices I broke the blends down into categories: Basic, Reactive, Aventurine, Reactive with Aventurine... then I priced accordingly keeping within the range set by other frit blend vendors.
I tried to take into account the cost of the materials while not putting either myself or one of my co-vendors out of business. Why did the packaging change? TOP
That's a simple one - I spend most of my "real life" in a hospital cath lab. It's a crazy, busy place, and I'm on call one third of the year. I also commute about 2.5 hours each day that I work, if the traffic isn't bad. I was offering about seven different packaging options for each frit, and it was getting totally out of hand. I needed a little sanity, so I decided to just offer the jars - they are nice, simple, lightweight and can be re-used for several different things. They're also easier for me to fill :) |
