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Saturday 21 March 2020

CiM Testing: Goddess

Handmade lamwork glass heart bead by Laura Sparling made with CiM Goddess

Goddess is a bright blue misty opal. The glass is fine to work with and the only issue I had with it was some slight fizzy scumming. At first I thought it was devitrification but when I inspected the first bead I made with it, after annealing, I realised it was probably just a case of what I’m calling ‘Blue Fussiness’. Some blue glasses like to be kept hot (think Effetre transparent Dark Aqua 036, or CiM Leaky Pen) and they don’t appreciate the temperature fluctuations that go alongside sculpting. My constant faffing about upset the glass and it fizzed, creating patches of white scummy-looking bits.

Handmade lamwork glass heart bead by Laura Sparling made with CiM Goddess

I had a second attempt and made a conscious decision to constantly keep the bead as warm as I could and I had a much better result, so yeah, classic Blue Fussiness. You can just see a little bit of the white microbubbling in the second photo, on the right hand side of the bead in the midsection.

The bead was photographed indoors in natural daylight.