new solid almond thing

It seems like some of the most interesting ideas for new product come from explorations of ideas that have no relation to commercial viability. To wit:

These almond-shaped solid glass elements, with their semi-sharp edge and hand-wrought variations, began as experiments for a possible installation in a gallery with exposed brick walls. In thinking about that texture and wanting to accentuate it, I thought it might be interesting to make some solid elements which would loosely magnify the surface behind them. So now the unfinished lenses are laying around the studio, and everyone who comes through is transfixed by them. They love the weight, love the optics, love the irregular forms – and everyone wants one. In fact, all but one of the samples I made for myself and the gallery (granted, the imperfect ones) are sold and gone.

This studio snapshot of the remaining piece is one of the larger ones we’ve made: it’s 15″ x 7.5″ x 4″, it weighs 18 lb and still wears the remains of its “sculpture punty” (that snotty bit on the back end that will eventually be ground and polished away). I am still exploring scale and thinking about price for these so I welcome your feedback.

The post New Lenses first appeared on StudioBlog :: Jeff Benroth Glass.