Gateway Plaza

The extensive refurbishment was to occupy three separate spaces within the Gateway Plaza, Circular Quay. The forms required impeccable precision to facilitate their installation into the specified manufactured fixtures.

One of the greatest challenges was the quantity and scale     of the forms. Physically hot glass equipment is only so big and human capacity to manage the material only so much. To manage the quantity we decided to make a series of moulds, but firstly we needed to make the patterns, or positives. Josh threw the forms on the ceramic wheel, but how do you achieve such accuracy

Now the positive was made Josh began the process of making 2 part moulds for each form, six moulds in total. The moulds needed to register perfectly, be absolutely symmetrical (no undercuts) and be full of 'airs' to facilitate the hot glass process.

I then travelled to Canberra Glassworks to blow the forms. Working with a highly skilled team of four in total we embarked on the job of blowing the quantity order.

We dominated the hot and cold shop once the forms started to appear from the lehrs. Each piece needed to be cut on the diamond saw, ground to a satin finish and most of the forms required a hole drilled in the bottom to facilitate the fixture.