Carmine's Parrot Window installed
Carmine's Parrot Window
Carmine's Vegetable Lamp
Complete stained glass cabinet doors
Carmine - color matching glass pieces
Right cabinet door
Left cabinet door
Testing lights
Waxing lamp
Carmine giving final cleaning
Antiqueing solder
Cleaning with steel wool
Upper support structure
Soldered - ready to assemble
Front of lamp - ready to solder
Side of lamp - ready to solder
Dean's Stained Glass
Carmine's Vegetable Lamp
After building his lamp, Carmine felt enough of a master of glass building to attempt building some cabinet door panels to match his lamp. He designed and built these door panels on his own, with only limited guidance from his teacher. These are now installed with his new lamp in his kitchen.
Dean's Stained Glass
Carmine called me about building a vegetable lamp to hang in his kitchen. Decades ago I built a fruit lamp that still hangs in my kitchen......but I had never heard of a vegetable lamp. An internet search still didn't enlighten me, so I told Carmine ..."If you draw it, I'll build it." With a little coaching on drawing for stained glass, he came up with an interesting design. Carmine lives in my area and wanted to learn how to build stained glass, so he worked with me on building this lamp.
Carmine's vegetable lamp was designed much like a pool table lamp.... to go over a kitchen island work area. We designed it with 2 light bulbs to minimize shadows and an open top to let light shine up as well as down. We had to build a special brass frame to hold the structure together. Carmine came up with an unusual hanging crossbar to add stability and came up with some arrow finials to finish his design. When we first started the project I thought Carmine was a little nutty, but his concept of a vegetable lamp actually came out quite well.
Carmine's lamp measures 9 3/4" high, 24" long and 14 1/2" deep. It contains 354 pieces of glass and was completed in January of 2010.
Carmine's Lamp - End ready to solderHardly Working
Side of lamp - ready to solder
Front of lamp - ready to solder
Carmine - color matching glass pieces
Upper support structure
Soldered - ready to assemble
Cleaning with steel wool
Antiqueing solder
Carmine giving final cleaning
Waxing lamp
Testing lights
Left cabinet door
Right cabinet door
Complete stained glass cabinet doors
Carmine followed up his succesful kitchen project with a brightly colored tropical scene designed to fit his back door. His bold choice of colors worked well and he proved he has mastered the basic skills of strained glass construction. His tropical masterpiece measures about 22" x 36" and is presently installed in his back door. Looks like the student has done well!
