What do you do with your boro "failures"?
 

Ok, you just opened your kiln and think "darn, that didn't turn out near as nice as I had hoped." So, it is still wearable, but maybe not so saleable. What do you do with it?

Hammer time!!!!

I just kind of leaving them sitting around my house forever. Sometimes I rework the piece. This works better with hollow stuff... a layer of gold fuming and some more clear will usually revive something. Ganky pendants, theres no hope... well, they could become a weird ring. Ganky mandrel beads, maybe, but thats a lot of bother.
Give for tips, well, I've done that... it doesn't have to be for bad service and usually it accompanies a real tip. Stuff that a connoisseur or a glass worker might not like, the average person in the street still thinks is cool. Or kids or family. Sometimes I'll give stuff like that to kids in the bead store.
Really, though at this point, especially since I'm somewhat conservative about trying new things and have a large arsenal of proven techniques, it only tends to be 2% of pieces that are lousy.

I am still learning so only about 2% of my stuff is worth keeping. :lol:

Eric

I don't actually have that many boro beads yet, so they're all hanging out in some plastic bags. There are some that are really ugly colors... they'll probably end up in the garden along with my soft glass bead failures.

I give them out as "free beads" at a show. People don't seem to think they're ugly (of course they have no idea what kind of look I was going for).
:-)
Anita
www.fireflybeads.com

They go into the "bowl of shame". :-({|=
I have 2 now, one in the kitchen and one in the studio.
Every now and then, I pick up the beads and check to see if the
cracks have healed. None so far, but I'll keep you posted.

Karen

I keep everything. It is sad. I don't know what I'll do w/ them, but I can't throw them out? :roll:
I do have a little place in front of my shop that I am thinking of making a flower bed, so I've thrown a few out there.
So they have been 'thrown out' but not 'away'. :-\"

For those of you who can't part with the beads, how about making a beaded curtain for a door or window? I don't think it would work very well with my pendants, but beads should work well. I also like the idea of the free bead/pendant bowl at shows. Someone else recommended having a bead bowl just for kids at shows. While the kids are picking ONE bead, the parents have a chance to look around and maybe buy something.

Eric

If my failures are really bad, I toss them in the herb garden. It adds visual interest and kids or birds seem to eventually find them and make off with them. If they're just disappointing, I usually manage to find someone to give them to.

I give them to the grandkids (my daughter pilfers through their "stash" when they aren't looking!) or what is really fun is to hang a bunch in the trees around the acreage we have and watch the expressions of joy when they come to visit and search out what is new in the trees........

I have a whole jar of stuff like that. One of these days I'll figure out something to do with it...

I toss mine in the woods or in a box. Somebody is gonna find a huge stash of shitty pendants in that dirt. :lol:

I ignore the lack of boro effect and appreciate the round shape....sounds like rationalization and denial to me....guess it's back to throwing them in the pond....carp are going to have a lot of new rocks to move around!!

Heat into a ball and pull down for use later on production work

Usually the reason ours aren't good is that they didn't strike to the color we wanted them to. I have jars of them! They look like little flower arrangements under my sink ( I never even bother to take them off the mandrels:roll: )

After reading a thread here the other day, we decided to try to kiln strike them at 1200 for a couple of hours and see what happened, and about 1/4 of them are now gorgeous! I can't remember who suggested that, but thanks!!!!

I have given several batches to people who make hemp necklaces and keychains. And to friends and family who do Saturday Markets. Anywhere that my name WON'T be attached to them, lol.

I have 2 big metal garbage cans. most stuff thats bad goes in there. Along with all our other scrap. then about once a year or so it gets taking to the landfill where it goes back to where it came.

I have learned time and again that no matter how much I hate something, someone else is sure to like it. I put them in my bargain bin or use them as trade goods when we go geo-caching.

I have had more people buy the beads I hate though. I tend to price things dependent on how much I like it. When people learn which beads I don't like, they seem to be the ones I sell first. Maybe there's a lesson in there somewhere.

If something is not shaped properly though, I give it to my husband to use as a fishing lure.


- Sandy

All of my wonkies/fuglies go into a jar at home. My step-daughter and all of her friends know it is a help yourself kinda thing, so they can't wait to visit to plunder the wonky jar :lol:

For some strange reason, my husband gets a kick out of my wonkies, so I just give them to him. (The truly ugly ones just go in the trash though.)

Anneal it properly anyway.

Then leave it on a window cill or somewhere someone will see it and pick it up.

Perhaps they might decide to keep it, or if they make similar stuff, realise what it is and put it back :-)

Either the pond, or the aquarium. My aquarium looks like it's had a very colorful shipwreck.

I like to keep failures around just to remind me of things.

I have a bubble gum machine in the den. I have been filling it with wonky and ugly beads. It is about 3/4 filled now and looks really nice.

Karen

If any of you folks would be interested in donating them to My local sick childrens hospital - I would be so very pleased and honored to have any of your non sellable ( Boro and soft glass ) beads. Last year around Christmas I asked for wonkies and seconds from the wonderful people here and I was sent beads from all over the world. It was just wonderful.

The kids really enjoyed having some "fun" time in a boring and sometimes depressing hospital where they are being treated for everything from injuries to termial illnesses.

I would love to continue doing this, so if anyone has any beads that they feel they would like to donate - send me a PM with your real name ( so I can put it in with your beads so the children know where these beads came from) and I will PM you my addy.

:)

I just went through my box of wonkies from when I first started playing with boro and reworked 60 old pendants late last week. It was worth it! I was able to burn the haze off quite a few and restrike them, as well as correct wonky shapes and bad loops. Some I heated to clear (thanks Smiley), and turned into hearts, and they turned out ok as well. And best of all they are selling! So, for a days work I now have a bunch more saleable material in the impulse purchase price range. Plus, to be honest with you, it was a lot of fun. Since they were essentially worthless in their old state I was able to play and experiment without that old "Boro Angel" on my shoulder whispering "$50 a pound, $50 a pound." :lol:

great idea! I might try that with some of my early attempts.

Patty, if you have some crappy beads just make sure you get all the bead release out, preheat them in the kiln and punty on to them, and you can turn them into marbles, pendants, etc.

What's your definition of "still wearable"? Does it include things that look like absolute vomit, as long as they have holes? (If it's got a hole, you can put a string through it. If you can put a string through it, you can wear it. You probably shouldn't, but you can.)

That describes most of my boro productions. What I do with them is let them sit on my dining room table for a long, long time, in the hope that the cats will make them disappear permanently, like they do with important and valuable things I really want to keep. When that fails to happen, I throw lots of them out. (No. Really. It's the best thing. You can't convince me that there's any way to magically transform beads once they've reached the point of looking like a mostly-digested Chinese dinner.) Then I put the rest of them in a box and send them to L****, whose name I will conceal because I want to have a hope of continuing to do this. She takes my beads, and she sorts through them, and sometimes she sends me money. She does a lot of shows and puts out a $2 bead bowl and a $5 bead bowl. If I send her anything she thinks is worth more than that, she takes it on consignment. Works for me!

I give them to a local potter, who puts them in the bottom of pots, fires them into nice flat puddles so that the failures don't look nearly so obvious.