What do you do with your boro "failures"?

[dpglassworks]

Originally Posted by e. mort

I am still learning so only about 2% of my stuff is worth keeping.

Eric

Me too!

[FosterFire]

Survey should also add -
becomes part of fish tank gravel
dropped in liquid soap container for weight
added to bead release jar to help mixing when you shake jar
given as tips to Starbucks people (they like them)
thrown into gravel in random parking lot or location for child to discover?

BUT lately I have been running through another kiln strike. Place in kiln, run up to 1080 or 1100-ish, leave for anywhere from 10 min to an hour, depending and sometimes the Beast turns into Beauty. I have been getting amazing resilts with GA Persimmon Strike - deeeeep yummy magenta purple - gorgeous!!

pssst - they may have some left on their "we love our customers" sale that is still happening!!!

[Sue in Maine]

They are mine! All mine! I'm still so fascinated by boro that I don't see failures at all. I see opportunities to learn. I'm not ashamed of them and I don't hate to look at them. These are the beads that are mine, all mine and no guilt in keeping them for myself!

Sue

[Pyroglasstic]

What I consider a failure I just put in a container next to the kiln,My wife always asks what wrong with these? and rescues them and takes them upstairs.According to her,there are no failures. I never throw 50 dollar a pound glass away.
Jeff

[Karen Hardy]

My latest thing to do with my boro (and other) failures is to use them
as decorative "rocks" in my fountain. It's just a small, tabletop one for the
studio (a little Feng Shui to get the money flowing in ) but it looks
great!

[Wendyki]

I will have to remeber some of these tips and ideas for now i keep everyhting even if its ugly its my ugly

[Rose Leslie]

I'm learning how to do some beads now with boro. I'm thinking about putting them into stepping stones. At least they would bring some color to them. Then I was thinking as some with a hammer and then get the frustration out. Oh well something to do.

[PaulaD]

I pretend they are normal and give them away!!


Paula

[sharyl]

they might not be worth letting anyone look at them but they make pretty color in bowls. I have a ton of bowls sitting around everywhere just cause they get thrown in and left forever. Most of what I make is crap so no biggie I am use to it.

[catsarthouse]

You could put them into concrete stepping stones. Just showing the pretty parts. It would be a nice way to make something after your efforts the first time.

[Bunyip]

Seems like there's always someone out there who will pay retail for what I consider a failure. <shrug>

[Jngljnke]

I've done most of the things mentioned. I've also discovered people will usually but them when I put them out. You never can tell what someone else will like.

[Nitadee]

Reuse and recycle. I heat them up in the kiln, punty up to them and start twisting the heck out of it. pull into a twisty, or what have you, and MOST of the time I have a viable piece of working glass. Worse case I have crappy glass that I can use on the inside of something else

[snowery]

are they really failures? i have made pendants that i thought were ugly and then comes along someone at the Sonoran Glass Art Academy that says, wow what a neat pendant, and i am thinking okay i don't think so. there is some out there in the world that will like your creation.
if you really do not want them then i can give you my sister-n-laws address to use them in her mosaics

[isellrejer]

Eric, you know me.... I want all your "not what I was after" things....lol

I give them to my best friend. Penny puts them in jars and her "beach garden" in her front yard, the birds like to go through it and spread them all over the yard, but Penny loves them in her garden. She gets all my cracked things that I don't want to fix and all the fuglies.

[queenofswords]

I make many into hearts or pull them into twisties.

[e. mort]

Wow, this is an old thread. LOL I have a lot less crappy work now than when I started, but when things don't turn out I lay a pile of them by my workbench and use them to play with when I am almost out of oxy or propane. I am a real miser when it comes to propane and oxy so I use every last bit of it. And some of the playtime work has turned into new ideas or some cool pendants for the kids bowl at the shows I do. Little pieces for $5 that kids can buy for themselves are very popular.

[torchgirl]

When I'm making bead sets and have one too big or too small, it goes in the Beads of Courage pile. I just started making marbles and was using dud implosion pendants to practice "round". Pulled bail off, heated stretched, folded back to back, added clear in crack, twisted and voila, spiral marble. Got idea from Glassline Vol 25 No 2, Ecofriendly spiral pod pendants.

[patezd]

This is a cool thread and gave me an idea. When my daughter was first born and I needed an artistic outlet but couldn't get to the studio, I made soap using the glycerine blocks you can buy at craft stores, essential oils, herbs, coloring, etc. So now I'm thinking I can use the beads I'm not so crazy about as "prizes" in bars of soap!

[deb tarry]

I like this one Paula 'I pretend they are normal and give them away!!'

[fyrsmith]

I break them up for frit, but the larger broken pieces (if they are not too sharp) I toss out on the local beach for "beach glass" collectors to find.

[alussher]

I keep all the failures- recently I've begun remixing old pendants, stringers, broken wine glass experiments mixing it down on the glass lathe several times and pulling it out into cane. Feels good to be using your own blends and shades.

www.alanussher.com

[jjglass]

I bought a table with a glass top that has an inset area. I dump all my bad glass into it. Even crap glass looks really pretty all jumbled together on display

[glasskat2010]

I put them in a box...aka my "rock box" and look at them to learn from my mistakes and try again.

[AVTrout]

I'm a soft glass gal and have had many rejects & fuglies. I like to keep them in a giant jar in the living room. It acts as a great door stopper! I've also given them away to my son's friends & teachers.

I always think that if a bead is ugly, try etching or tumbling it. Sometimes it turns out to be a real "diamond in the rough".

[Flame Ryder]

We have a fountain in our garden and add our failures to the fountain. They look great as the water cascades over them and our neighbors think we rock with our artistic interpretaion of coral.

[Pyroglasstic]

I have a container of what I consider flawed stuff or rejects.Of course Im the only one who thinks they are flawed or rejects.My sister comes over and buys some stuff for gifts a couple times a year.She always request a look at the rejects and buys some of them too.There are always some I wouldnt charge her for.

[Glassbot]

I'm still new so they are all "my babies" LOL! A lot of them I keep because they represent an idea that I want to work on later; others I keep because I am learning to move forward, not back, so I try again instead of trying to rescue (although I have, occasionally).

[deb tarry]

I keep allot of them too for the same reason and I also rework them. Here is a picture of the stash area which is right beside my torch. It's ideas at my finger tips. The blue box is full of good ideas gone bad. lol

[Elegance_1]

I put them in a bowl at whatever venue I'm at and sell them cheap.