Vintage Windows Into Stained Glass Mosaics
6 Materials
I found all of these vintage windows that came out of a 1930's home near a town I live in. I got 10 windows and a few of them were quite small 22" x 17" but they had 3 panels of glass each. They sat in my studio for months until the creative light bulb came on and I new what I wanted to do with them! I also had some scraps of stained glass that I had picked up at a thrift store months before. That is how these mosaics were born.
This one was the first one I did. I started by braking the glass that I had with a hammer but I also used a tile or glass nipper. I bought mine at Home Depot for $14.95. After I had broken the glass I separated each colour. I used a non permanent marker to draw the design on the reverse side of the window. You should had cleaned the glass really well before the previous step .
After I cleaned the glass, I began to glue glue the pieces of stained glass on my design. If a piece of glass was too large to fit I just used the nippers to trim it to fit. Be careful when doing this, make sure you wear safety glasses and gloves.
Glue first your main design and then glue the background. After you are all done glueing let it cure for at least 24 hours. I used E600 glue.
After letting it cure for the 24 hour you will need to grout it! You can buy different kinds and colours of grouts. I used the charcoal unsanded kind for mine. Follow manufacturers directions when doing this.
These mosaics are very easy to do, it is like painting by numbers but with glass.
I hope these instructions and examples of my work might inspire someone!
For this last mosaic I used white grout because I wanted to keep the wintery look!
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2 of 27 comments
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Love them!
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Stunning! Stunning!! Stunning!!! Your work is to die for gorgeous!
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Your art work is to die for gorgeous! I might have thought of trying stained glass when I was a stay at home mom; I always watched the how to shows while my babies nursed. I didn't know you could do stained glass with grout. The flux and solder iron made me hesitant.
Now I know it is the height of bad manners to critique art, but the 3-piece window of roses is just crying out to me for a little more detail on the right panel. Your thoughts please?
I love all of your windows ,very creative. If understanding right, you took already stained glass broke them up and pieced them together on a bigger window? Or did you make your own ? They are beautiful either way.
Love your work! On the first window, the tree with buttons, did you add the buttons after grouting? Or glued at the same time as the stained glass pieces?