what got you started?

16 years ago

sorry if this topic has been posted any time recently but i was just wondering what inspired everybody to start making mosaics.

while i was making all the xmas presents i started thinking about why i got into it. i've always loved crazy, colourful, sparkly things... just to look at ... i wouldn't be caught dead wearing colours that are anything but drab... then i saw a tv show about 'weird houses' or 'strange houses'.. something like that.. and it featured isaiah zagar's house, which is covered with mosaic inside and out. i remember just thinkng, 'wow.. i need to get into that somehow.'

soooo.. i bought some books on mosaic, got some supplies and found this place last summer. now i'm an addict.

what about you??

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Comments (18)

joyy
Original Author
16 years ago
OH...and i forgot to mention that dw left all the candle holders behind when she went up north to her family's on wednesday. i called her on her cellphone just after she'd passed north bay and she realized they were still in the basement. i'd drive them up there but it's 8 hours away...

guess they'll have to wait.
Calamity_J
16 years ago
I've always loved stained glass and any colored glass and somehow found the garden junk forum after just getting into copperfoil stained glass, and learned about mosaic on the garden junk and have been addicted ever since! I still like my totems too!!! And now I HAVE to make 3d mosaics!!!!Ohhh, I love it!
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nicethyme
16 years ago
I had a book on garden mosaics forever and kept saying one day I'm gonna try this...

then I saw pictures by Slowmedown in the junkyard and I was so inspired, I ordered tools and glass and dug out my oldest bowling ball. about... 14 months ago
bamasusanna
16 years ago
It all started back in 2nd grade. I made my first mosaic butterfly out of fruitloops! It was the talk of Woodmeade Elementary School.

Fast forward to 1988. I began to do stained glass. It was just something I always wanted to try. After a few years, I ended up with a LOT of scrap. That's when I remembered MOSAICS!!
I started by doing stepping stones. That's all I did (about 100 of them) until I found this forum back in March of this year. I've gotten so much inspiration to try other bases. I've started doing mirrors, birdbaths, etc. and I look forward to expanding my horizons!
seaglassic
16 years ago
me too, for the garden junk forum. I think it was around 2003 and there were a few regulars on there.
I remember the topic switching to bowling balls, then we dabbled in cement leaves and glass totems...
we had a few get-togethers and swapped garden junk, for projects..

there were the hobby horses for the yard and baby cribs to collect, for the spindle sides, for either hose guards or stakes for a border along the bedding plants

all along the mosaic was a subject but not the main one.
it started to progress...
and some of you may remember one time we had an upheaval, when someone posted a picture of a goddess, with the question of what to do with it..
it was a joke, that someone on her favorite forum had suggested that she contact the garden junk forum...
because "they mosaic anything"..
it wasn't very nice for a while about that..it stepped on many toes and got tempers all riled up...lol

but the mosaic things still kept showing up on the pictures to be posted..it seemed to always be the favorite of whatever was being made.

I migrated over here, by a suggestion of someone who had been on both forums.
I stayed and sorta left the garden junk forum behind.

then, one day, I was extra mad at my "significant bother" as I've referred to him in the past..lol
and I took a set of colorful patterned dishes and threw them on the kitchen floor, one at a time,... more out of frustration and anger...he was at work at the time.

and that, dear friends, is exactly how I got my very first stash of broken dishes!

true story.
LinLee
16 years ago
About 2 years ago we decided to do glass tiles in the bathroom. Ended up with 50 square feet of extra glass
because I changed the floor tiles to limestone so was looking for somewhere to dump/use the over $500 of spare
glass tiles. Found this mosaic forum...but still have 5 full box's of tile in the garage...oh well.
crystal01
16 years ago
I'm a crafter and I've always loved mosaics and was forever saying I was going to do something. I lurked here for about 6 months. Collected supplies and tools. Then the Fry Pan challenge made me come out of lurkdom and the rest is an addiction...
barbfrizzell1955
16 years ago
I saw a picture of a BB gazing ball in the book Backyard Mosaics I think. I was too cheap to buy the book so I searched online for ideas. That's how I found the Junkyard right around the time that Slow started posting her stuff there. Kinda drifted away for awhile and on one of those many nights when I couldn't sleep I came to this site and was surprised by how much activity there was. Started reading the old posts and I've been here ever since. I spend WAY TOO MUCH time reading the posts (when I could be mosaicing something) and go through withdrawal pains if I miss a few days!

Barb
Calamity_J
16 years ago
LINLEE: Sell us your leftovers!!! Or Trade!!! I just had to go look at that great pic of you from the old album, in your bathrm! Just an idea from someone who Never has enough "Stuff"!lol!
mosaicwench1
16 years ago
Like calamity and others, I got hooked on the Garden Junk forum.

I have an art degree that I've never used professionally but have always "tinkered" with something artistic. My kids are getting older and I found I had more time on my hands to "play" a little deeper into any media I chose. Bowling balls got me started and then windows became my obsession.
mmqchdygg
16 years ago
I found the 'junk' forum here a couple years ago, and then you all started talking about mosaics...I wanted to do it, but never got around to it. I just figured it had to be "too involved" and I probably didn't have time to learn it. In September, I found the SG forum at DG, and saw a backsplash that was simply incredible (to me, anyway...)lots of different tesserae...the lady had 'commissioned' it from someone...it had lots of amber tones...real tiles, glass globs, and a pile of other stuff.
The board over there isn't very busy, though, and I remembered that GW had a SGM board, so here I am.
That was late Sept...then I started the backsplash, and that was it. I'm hooked.

And for the record, as much as other boards claim to have the "best" group of people...I've found so far that THIS board really does. There's lots of personalities, but we're all "on the same page" and no one is a know-it-all, and there's no drama. It's all good.
rchovey
16 years ago
I started with stained glass about 9 yrs ago. Then I tiled my bathroom floor, then I tiled the floor in the downstairs rec. room and with all that leftover tile, mosaics came naturally. First thing I made was my wonderful bench that succumbed to the elements because I used a wooden substrate outdoors, that was a heartbreaker. Now I'm an addict. I want to mosaic everything I see.
becky_ia
16 years ago
What a great thread! Very interesting...everyone has their own story and love to hear them all.

Mine started about 25 years ago when I took a stained glass class. Made a couple of projects and then let stuff sit for about 15 years. After kids grew up and more time on my hands, became interested in gardening. One day when in an Earl May store, there was this beautiful stained glass Iris stepping stone that had a price tag of $50 on it. Said to my husband, "I love that stone, BUT I am NOT paying $50 for it. I can do that myself." But I couldn't find out how they did it. I went to to many stores and tryed to explain it. Could only find the stepping stone kit with handprints and glass marbles in them. Kept at it and finally found a hobby lobby that had the molds & everything else I needed. Went on the internet and found several site explaining the process. After making hundreds of stepping stones, and having all that scrap glass...mosaics became the natural.

My husband loves to tell everyone that his wife wouldn't spend $50 to buy that original stone, but spent over $500 (for all the supplies) to make our own!

Becky
icheer
16 years ago
I also became interested as a by-product of stained glass and wondering what in the heck to do with all those glass scraps! I was/am too big of a tightwad to toss them and started looking for something to create with them. I stumbled on this board accidentally and have been hooked ever since then. It's hard to believe that a year ago "glassing" wasn't in my life because now it practically consumes me!

This folks on this board are the BEST at encouraging newbies, sharing ideas and encouragement, brainstorming, and I love the variety of styles offered! Like mmqchdygg shared - the drama and ego free environment here is so refreshing compared to other boards I've visited.
Shades_of_idaho
16 years ago
I always have been interested in doing mosaics. Bought an old book at a yard sale many years ago an drooled over it mant times. Such a GREAT book. They used all kinds of things. Nails and screws rocks and of course the usual. GREAT BOOK!! It all seemed so much to do I was too afraid for so many years. So I quilted instead. Now my hands will not let me quilt. They go numb too fast. I used to hang out at the Junk Yard and so many did mosaics there. Finally someone at the junk yard sent me cut up plate pieces. A friend passed away and I became the proud owner of her old iron patio table which I always loved. Some broken tiles from her bathroom remodel. The desire.

The first piece is a nightmare or ruff sharp unsanded grout wreck. I did everything wrong. But I love it and treasure it because it was Helen's table and some of her stuff and some stuff from another friend. Shrug. I was hooked instantly.

Chris
shrty411
16 years ago
I think MANY years ago there was an article in one of the woman's magazines about mosaicing a flower pot. Not long after that I was in Micheals getting something for some school project. Picked up a couple books and the rest is history. I had some lags at times/I found the junkyard, but now I am in mosiac heaven!!

Maria
very_vintage
16 years ago
I started doing leadlight when I was 18. After having my daughter 5 yrs ago, Im still going strong. Except now Im madly into mosaic. I was looking for a less toxic alternative. Its stuck.
texaswild
16 years ago
Don't remember when the first desire surfaced - maybe when I was going through withdrawals from an exciting job when I retired in 2001. During that very restless period, I bought a book on mosaics, and found a comment in the book "Beware, mosaicing is very addictive", interesting. First piece was a complete disaster. Then after the third move (in the attempt to settle down) I remodeled the kitchen and mosaiced the stove backsplash, and BOOM - there was no turning back, and it totally consumed my WHOLE life. I LOVE what BECKY IA said re spending a fortune to avoid buying an expensive piece. Been there, done that, and I soooo agree w/ICHEER's comment - "ego-free environment" on this forum. Thank y'all for being such a great family of teachers.

what got you started?

Comments (18)

joyy
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Calamity_J

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joyyOriginal Author

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joyy
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