When Color Just Works

I finally got my butt back on the torch the other day, and let me say - it was so much fun! There's just something that happens to me when I pick out just the right glass colors to melt and layer together.

I've done greens with purples many times before, but I have never combined these particular shades. The glass colors I used on this set are from CiM (Heffalump and Dirty Martini), Effetre (Dark Lavender, Dark Violet Transparent, Yellow Green and Sage Green Transparent) and Precision (Diamond Clear).

Oh, magic! Usually, instead of the minty freshness of Dirty Martini, I use the reactive Copper Green. Using DM gave a cleaner, crisper finish to the mint green opaque base on these beads, without the tendency to patina with copper that Copper Green has. And the opacity was dense and smooth. (Opacity? Is that a word? Opaqueness?)

Heffalump, Cim's lavender opaque glass, replaced my usual Effetre Pale Lavender. Heffalump is more vivid and has less of a tendency to fade than PL, and just glows under lights.

I normally use a lighter shade than Effetre's Dark Violet Transparent (like, say, Ink Blue Violet), but with the Heffalump, it just sings. It's so deep I had to really layer it thinly, but encasing it with the Dark Lavender Effetre really helped bring out the color.

Yum. I am really happy with this set. So happy that I couldn't break it up into smaller bites like I usually do to list them on Etsy. This time I just lumped them all together and put them up on ebay - something I haven't done in months. There are more pics at the auction, so have a look!