Ellen Blakeley and Tempered Glass Mosaics

Ellen Blakeley and Julie

I spent the weekend in Oakland at the Institute of Mosaic Art attending a wonderful two-day class by Ellen Blakeley.  I finished three tempered glass mosaics and learned much more about grouting with many colors in one piece. Below is the purple and blue piece I made to match my shirt and the Hardenbergia on the left. The circle has papers underneath the tempered glass, and the one on the bottom had a design on the wood that I mosaiced over. 

Purple and blue mosaic to match my shirt!

Tempered glass with different colors of grout

And the good thing is that I bought two of the flower rectangles below (at a thrift store) so I can make another one using better tools that I have here at home. Like my ring saw or my Beetles and Bits system for cutting pieces in any shape. At Ellen's suggestion I cut out plate glass to put over the flowers but the glass cutter that was available was not very flexible (to me, at least). So next time I'll cut out pieces that fit the flower and leaves better. 

I'm also going to add to the grout color by using her fantastic method for changing color after you've grouted. I learned it in her first class and have used it on other mosaics, but it was good to have a refresher course to remember how you're really suppose to do it!!!

Ellen is a wonderful hands-on teacher who is always willing to share her ideas and techniques with the class. We used epoxy to glue the pieces of tempered glass to the base. What a sticky mess that was! But I suppose you get better at it after some practice. I did spend quite a bit of time with a razor blade scraping off the epoxy residue on the top of the glass. 

Mosaic Sea Creatures Before and After

It's never easy to get a picture of these sparkly grouts, but here are the before and after pictures. I wasn't happy with all the warm gray grout so I painted the sun grout with yellow glitter and the sea with sparkly turquoise glitter. One picture was taken outside and one inside so that alone makes it difficult to get a good comparison.

I used the technique Ellen Blakeley taught in her tempered glass class. You mix acrylic gel medium with Pearl Ex pigments and then paint in onto unsealed grout. Let it sit for a minute and then wipe it off the glass. You never know how it will turn out but that's the fun of it all. I will try to get a better picture of the mosaic after the painting is done. It really does brighten it up.