How its Made
An overview of our creation Process
Our jewelry starts as large sheets of colored Bullseye Glass that we cut into strips and arrange layer by layer into bricks of pattern. These bricks are lightly fused together in a special oven, picked up on the end of a long solid rod, and heated and compressed to fully fuse the blocks and remove the air bubbles. Once evenly heated, the bricks are pulled into long thin rods. These rods are placed into an annealing oven to allow them to cool to room temperature in a controlled way.
Once cooled, the rods are chopped into smaller pieces known as murini. When fully fused, our glass naturally pools to a 6mm thickness. So we cut the chunks to at least 6mm to avoid distorting the patterns. We arrange the tiny blocks into a template mold and fuse the bits into a single tablet. These tablets are then cut into different shapes using strip cutters and a special glass cutting band saw, and Marc uses a larger diamond bladed saw to cut each newly shaped piece in half.
What makes our work so special is its finish. It is baby smooth, but not shiny, allowing the viewer to take in the intricacies and lenticular effect caused by the layering of transparent and opaque glasses. Once cut, each individual piece is machine polished using 2 different abrasive sizes, and then hand polished using 3 more. A quickly calibrated heat polish finalizes our satin polish. This is not production work- we know. Having investigated a myriad of ways to achieve our finish, there simply is no substitute for elbow grease
Being unable to find adjustable findings that suited us, we have begun making them in-house. We hand craft them from stainless steel, ensuring they remain both shiny and low maintenance. Likewise, all our pin and pendant backs are stainless and stamped with our logo when possible. Our ear wires remain sterling silver, requiring only the occasional buff to keep them gleaming and tarnish-free.
Meet the Team
Kari Russell-Pool
Check out Kari's separate bodies of work by clicking on the link to his website above!
Marc Petrovic
Check out Marc's separate bodies of work by clicking on the link to his website above!
Kay Petrovic
Kay is a full time student who studies Managerial Marketing at Kent State University as a part of their honors college program.
Hank Petrovic
Hank is one spoiled puppy who loves walks, treats, and occasionally cuddles. He is a full time artist manager and often spends his days at the studio micromanaging the employees. He spends his free time in his fenced in backyard suntanning. Follow Hank on instagram to stay up to date on all of his antics.