Kaplan Creations Jewelry and Glass Design

I’ve taken a pretty long hiatus from making jewelry, but am now slowly getting back on track. In the meantime I’ve been spending my free time lampworking, taking classes, and learning new techniques. Last month I took two classes taught by Mary Lockwood at Glass Firenze, located here in Eagle River. One of the classes was on encasing beads, the other was on making floral beads. Both were terrific, but as you can see from the picture, I still have a lot of practicing to do.

The boro glass workshops given by William Hagy are some of the best classes that I’ve ever attended! I attended the Intro to Boro I and II classes (beads and pendants) and then decided to also attend the glass sculpture class. This was quite a learning experience for me as I had only worked on soft glass. I had a lot of trouble adjusting my flame correctly, and wasn’t used to the idea of continually adjusting my flame. William is not only a terrific teacher, but is very patient when having to explain the same thing multiple times! He nicely balances demonstrations with hand-on work and is happy to come to your torch and help you out when you get into trouble. I really appreciated his keen sense of humor as well. Many thanks to Deborah at Glass Firenze for bringing him up to Alaska. Make sure you don’t pass up the opportunity if you are ever given a chance to attend any of his workshops.