BEST HOUSEWARMING GIFT IDEAS

How many times we all were facing a problem of finding appropriate housewarming gifts for our friends and family. Buying an apartment or a house is an enormous step for them, and we want to contribute and make it an unforgettable event. We can do it with a unique housewarming gift.

There’s no doubt that there is a great variety of home décor products in the market which can serve as housewarming gifts. However, only some of them are unique enough so they can stand out among other gifts of this kind. Fine glass art is a great choice when deciding on housewarming gifts. The best thing is that glass art works come in a variety of shapes, sizes, colors and functions so you will find some excellent pieces for any home decor.

Glass Artworks as Centerpieces

When it comes to centerpieces, a unique, hand-made glass piece can become a focal point of any room. A new host will be grateful for getting a high-quality blown glass vase or other centerpiece which will dress up their room or office.

Home Décor Glass Pieces Ideas

A glass vase is one of the ideas for housewarming gifts. You will find a huge variety of glass vases that you can choose from. However, only some of them can be called a piece of art and constitute an original way of decorating a new home. A glass vase in its best will make a statement about uniqueness of your host, so while choosing a housewarming gift, pick the one which will match personality of a new home owner. Also, bear in mind that a glass vase will not be necessarily utilized by the owner to hold flowers. Therefore, select the piece which is a decoration in itself.

Glass bowls are excellent housewarming gift ideas. They can not only be a piece of home décor but also be utilized to serve food or hold small decorating items. Possibilities are endless. Hand-made glass bowls are underutilized as centerpieces. However, properly displayed, they can wonderfully complement home décor.

Glass art candle holders are truly exceptional in home décor. They are loved by new home owners as they are a wonderful way of warming, often still unorganized and under decorated rooms of a new house.

Colour and Type of Glass Housewarming Gifts

While picking a glass housewarming gift, the type of glass, its colour as well as size need to be taken into consideration. However, very often we do not have the knowledge of what the new house owner’s ultimate décor idea is, and what each room’s style will be. That is why it is recommended to either enquire about the colours and décor which will dominate in the rooms, or simply choose the pieces which are neutral in its colour and style, such as a beige vase or a greyish bowl.

If none of these are possible, take your glass housewarming ideas a little further and simply decide on getting a dinner set. There is no doubt that a couple of hand-blown glasses or/ and fused plates will make the host happy. Also, it is easier not to make a wrong choice when picking the plates or glasses as their colour and style can be easily accommodated by the host through matching the set with an appropriate style and colour of the table cloth.

When it comes to http://www.glamorous-glass.com/Galicjan-Poland/">housewarming gifts , glassware and glass homes décor pieces will surely be a winner at the housewarming party.

NEW YORK, NEW YORK...

A few days ago we came back from our first trip to New York City. And we must say we fell in love with this city. So majestic and classy...at least Manhattan where we spent most of our time:) Three days in NYC resulted in painful feet. After all we were walking around for 12 hours straight three days in a row as we wanted to get as much as possible from this trip. And we did. Empire State Building, the Statue of Liberty, the New York Public Library, Broadway, Time Square...And our favourite-Central Park.

We also decided to visit the Metropolitan Museum of Art (the MET) where we spent a couple of hours admiring ancient and contemporary art. We could not resist to spend a lot of time looking at ancient and medieval pieces of functional and artistic glass and ceramics. It is amazing that such fragile material like glass survived hundreds 0r even thousands of years. A number of pieces are examples of Roman and Greek art, and are dated to even the Hellenistic era. There was a lot of large footed bowls, possibly used for mixing wine, often belonging to a small group of luxury glass vessels. Some of the glass bowls represent masterpieces of glassmaking from the period when cast glass was beginning to be supplanted by vessels made using the newly invented technique of glassblowing. There was a number of pieces with engraved scenes from Greek or Roman mythology. Besides art glasswork coming from early centuries of human civilization, there are also vessels representing trends in the XIXth or early XXth centuries. One of the examples are beautiful glass vases designed by Loui Confort Tiffany. The shapes, colors, and finishes of Tiffany's vases and plaques were inspired by the natural world and by ancient glass.

Here is a couple of pictures of the pieces we had a chance to admire, as well as a wonderful panorama of New York City.

OUR TRIP TO EUROPE

It was a blast! Too short though. Well, that's how it is when you're having fun-time flies, and our three-week trip to Poland and Lithuania ended few days ago.

The trip was a combination of pleasure and business. Pleasure, as it was my little sister's wedding (well, I guess not that little anymore). And you must know that Polish weddings are quite pompous :-). Although the wedding ceremony is important, this is always a party that all guests are waiting for. And this one brought enjoyment to all of the 100 guests. The banquet hall was located in a beautiful part of eastern Poland, facing a picturesque river and being surrounded by wild forests. It was a country-style party, with traditional Polish food, drinks, roasted over the fire ham, fireworks, and dancing until 7.00 am!

We traveled a bit in Poland looking for new suppliers who offer unique hand-made glass products. Indeed, we established several contacts and are hoping to start fruitful cooperation.

Our trip to Lithuania was amazing! If you have a chance, do not hesitate to visit Vilnius, the capital. This beautiful city provided us with time to relax when strolling along the streets of the Old Town. Impressive history, wonderful food, enormous number of relics. We stayed at the monastery led by Polish nuns. They provided us with unbelievable hospitality, tasty home-made meals, and a lesson of history. Amazing people!

Vilnius is a home for Stiklo Paslaptis, a glass artists' studio where we found extremely beautiful glass art pieces. We're looking forward to bring some of them to Canada so our clients can enjoy warmth and cosiness provided by these pieces. Above is a sample of their work.

Meanwhile, don't forget about Glamorous Glass when you are looking for a special gift or an original piece of home decor. We have both :-)

DELIBERATIONS ON DECORATIVE GLASS

Glass does not only have industrial and practical value. Its characteristics are widely used by glassworks and artists who make original pieces of art-highly valued collectibles.

The artistic decorative glass products are shaped of liquid glass. This liquidity allows an artist to create various, rich in shape products-real pieces of art. Glass can be called a medium for artists.

It is impossible to talk about decorative art glass without mentioning the Murano glassmaking history. Their tradition of precision in glassworks is maintained since the 13th century. Due to its uniqueness Murano glass is often referred to as “cristallo”.

There are two opinions on how Murano, the island in the Venetian Lagoon became a centre of glassmaking. It is being said that in 1291 the Venetian Republic, fearing that fire used by glassmakers might burn down Venice’s wood buildings, ordered its glass artists to move their foundries to Murano. This way the glassmakers became the noblest citizens of this island. Another, more frequently suggested opinion, is that the move was made to isolate the glassblowing masters and prevent them from sharing their knowledge with foreigners. Glass making became a trade exclusively for those born on the island of Murano, and whoever glassmaker left the Venetian State was condemned to death as a traitor.

In the 1400s, the Italian island of Murano became the centre of glass luxury. Many new glass making techniques were developed there and Murano played a main role in the export trade of dinnerware, glass vases, mirrors and other luxurious items. A distinguishing feature of glass pieces made by Venetians was their content and a technique of making. Local quartz pebbles were almost pure silica ground into clear sand and combined with soda ash obtained from the Levant.

The contemporary Venetian glass art flourished in the 50ths and 60ths of the 20th century. Murano is still a Mecca for artists and glass lovers. The Murano School remains one of the most important in the world, and the art of glassmaking, just like centuries ago is still handed down from father to son.

However, not only the Italians became famous of their glass making skills. It is worth to mention that the Czech Republic Region of Bohemia and Moravia is a significant source of European glass making traditions. From the earliest days, the Czechs were setting tone in European and world art of glass making.

The United States are famous for making artistic glass items as well. The American glassworks tradition comes from the colonial times, when green glass house ware was produced. Currently, there are a lot of individual artists, and the art in glass is practiced and taught in the universities.

Beginning in the 19th century, a variety of extravagant glass items, such as glass vases started to become an important part of the decorative art. Particularly significant impact on development of decorative glass had the Art Nouveau movement. The members produced coloured pieces, often in cameo glass (a form of glass art involving etching and carving through fused layers of differently coloured glass; the main characteristic are white figures carved on black background), as well as using the lustre technique.

With the 20th century came an era of revolutionary technology. Machines were developed which replaced traditional mouth blowing with a semi-automatic process, and transformed the craft into an industry. A new mould-etch process was invented which allowed to reduce manufacturing costs. This led to cheap glassware in the 1930s, later called “Depression glass”.

Classical man-made glassblowing maintaining the tradition and knowledge of ancient glassblowers became an art. Today's glassblower still utilizes the basic blowpipe, but now they have a vast number of supplementary tools to aid in working the material.

Here are the most common techniques to produce glass art:

• blowing: a glassblower works at a furnace full of molten glass using metal rods and hand tools to blow and shape almost any form of glass;
• kiln-casting: can be done at the furnace at the torch or in a kiln; generally the artist makes a mould out of refractory, sand, or plaster and silica which can be filled with either clear glass or coloured or patterned glass;
• fusing, slumping: usually glass is only heated enough to impress a shape or a texture onto the piece, or to stick several pieces of glass together without glue;
• flame working: the artist generally works at a bench using rods and tubes of glass, shaping with hand tools to create their work;
• hot sculpting;
• cold-working;

The most common glass objects include vessels such as bowls, glass vases, bottles, etc. as well as paperweights, beads, sculptures and installation art.

UNCOMPLICATED STORY OF GLASS

The art of glass making has been practiced for centuries. The history of man-made glass dates back even to 3500 BC, and the origins are traced to Syria, Mesopotamia or Egypt.

Naturally occurring glass in a form of obsidian was used even by Stone Age societies whose members utilized it to produce sharp cutting tools. However, the archaeological evidence suggests that the first true glass was made somewhere in north coastal Syria, Mesopotamia or Old Kingdom Egypt. Egypt, with its preserving climate, is a place where we can find a lot of early glass items. Glass beads are thought to be the earliest man-made glass products and date back to 3500 BC. They have been found in Egypt and Eastern Mesopotamia. The oldest fragments of glass vases are said to originate in Mesopotamia 1600 BC.

A rapid growth in glass making techniques is assigned to the area of Late Bronze. By the 15th century BC, Western Asia, Crate and Egypt became extensive glass producers. They knew and safely guarded a technological secret of initial fusing of glass from raw material. Glass workers in other areas of the world had access only to imported pre-formed glass forms.

There is lack of evidence how glass advanced between 15th and 9th century BC. Over these years glass production was centred in Alexandria. From this place it spread to Italy.

The Hellenistic period brought many new techniques of glass production, and glass became to be used in making larger pieces, such as table ware. During this period, colorless and decoloured glass became valued, and methods to have it created studied in a more comprehensive way. However, it was only the first century BC that brought a real revolution: glass blowing technique was discovered on the Syro-Palestinian coast. This technique involved blowing glass inside moulds by using a long thin tube which since then has changed very little. This way they produced a variety of hallow glass items, such as glass vases. Until then the process of creating a small glass item was very prolonged in time; it could take several days to make the product by casting, core forming or cutting. The introduction of glass blowing led to significant changes in the glass making process and contributed to making glass vessels easy and inexpensive to produce. Then, ancient Romans began blowing glass inside moulds which increased shape possibilities for hollow glass items.

The Romans were responsible for spreading glassmaking technology and creating foundations for developing glasswork traditions across Western Europe. During the rule of Emperor Augustus, glass usage flourished across France, German and other European countries. Also the Romans as the first ones began using glass in architecture when clear glass was discovered in Alexandria around 100 AD.

However, the decline of the Roman Empire led to the slowing down of the progress in glass making. The archaeological discoveries from the 7th and 8th century show the transition from ancient to Middle Ages ways of producing glass, and in the 10th century a new technique of glassmaking, when soda glass is replaced with potash obtained from the burning trees, was initiated. The Middle Age introduced Venice as a main actor in glass making in the Western World. In 1271, the ban on imports of foreign glass and on foreign glass artists wanting to work in Venice was introduced. In 1291 the Venetian Republic ordered the glass makers to move their foundries to Murano. The second half of the 15th century brought quartz and potash made from sea plants to the Murano glass making tradition. Pure crystal started to be produced.

In 1688 French glass making introduced a new process for production of plate glass, which can be used in mirrors. The “plate pouring” process resulted in glass with good transmission qualities.

The 19th century was a beginning of a significant change: glass making started evolving towards industry more than the craft. Mass production of glass products was introduced along with an invention of the tank furnace by Friedrich Siemens. It allowed produce greater quantities of molten glass.

With the 20th century came an era of revolutionary technology. Machines were developed which replaced traditional mouth blowing with a semi-automatic process, and transformed the craft into an industry. Classical man-made glassblowing became an art, maintaining the tradition and knowledge of ancient glassblowers. Today's glassblower still utilizes the basic blowpipe, but now they have a vast number of supplementary tools to aid in working the material.

This and other articles written by Glamorous Glass you can find on http://ezinearticles.com/, http://www.articlesnatch.com/, and http://www.articlesengine.com/

GLASSBLOWING TECHNIQUES

Glassblowing Techniques