The anatomy of a cool stained glass project...

For this series, I wanted to take the time to illustrate the process behind actually putting together a stained glass piece.  This piece was inspired by a dear friend of mine who suggested that Japanese themed handmade is really popular right now. So I set about to find a pattern that illustrated a nice, simplistic version of a koi fish or a koi pond. So I found this pattern and modified it in Glass Eye to make it my own:

The pieces print out from Glass Eye with numbers, so with my two copies in hand, I set about to cut out the pattern pieces by hand, using the foil scissors that cut a slight margin to account for the foil and the solder lines and make the piece fit so much better. This is what it looked like after I was done...

I drew the arrows on the water pieces to illustrate a sort of "flow" in the blue glass that I'd planned on using. So I picked my glass, washed it and set about to gluing my pattern pieces directly to the glass for cutting.

I chose four colors for this piece...a semi-opaque brown for the ground, a semi-transparent blue for the water, the koi with a white body and orangey detailed fins. Once the glue was dry, it was off the the cutting table:

And then to the grinder:

One more final fitting, then I take the piece with me to work to foil:

Foiling completed and another fitting check, and now the piece is ready to solder:

So now you can see how the water "flows" in the same direction, and the ground is also somewhat "molded" around the bend of the pattern. Should have this ready to solder and finish by Sunday. Will update once piece is finished.