EzellGlass

As far back as I can remember, I have always been drawn to fire arts. As a kid I wanted to be a firefighter, and in high school I had my first hands on experience with fire art with a ceramics class. When a career in firefighting didn’t go according to plan, I felt lost and hopeless.

I was lucky enough to have a family friend who redirected my attention with an apprenticeship with her professional-level, artist blacksmithing husband in the Bay Area. For two years, I spent months hammering steel with a 10lb hammer only to create one finished piece. Then one day the blacksmith decided to introduce me to his glassblowing friends. I watched them create dozens of lampshades in an afternoon and was instantly hooked. So I decided to take on two apprenticeships, one blacksmithing and one glassblowing. Glassblowing is an expensive art - it’s not like just going to the park to paint - so for the next 17 years, I kept extra day and night jobs to help me play for classes and blow time. I tried to make sure that I was in the glass shop at least once a week either helping or practicing my own style. Eventually, I became a co-owner in the glass shop, taught my own classes, and had some of the best glass blowers in the Bay Area assisting me. Twenty years, two kids and a big move to the Cascades of Washington later and I am still infatuated with glass and its infinite possibilities.