Harakeke in Amber September 5, 2026 17:48

Every piece has a story that never makes it onto the price tag. When most people see the finished piece they have no idea how many decisions, changes of mind, and small disasters sit behind it. I thought it was worth pulling one piece apart properly and telling its story - Harakeke in Amber.

The Idea:  Harakeke has always felt like an intricate part of my practice. Over the years I've braided or plaited it, using it to support individual glass pieces of a wall skirt. I've also played with incorporating the plant visually. It's such a familiar shape here in Aotearoa — those long, sweeping leaves, the way a whole plant reads as movement even standing still so it’s important to get it right. I wanted the leaves to feel like they were caught mid-sway, and I wanted the amber to do most of the emotional work. Amber has a warmth to it that clear or pale glass simply doesn't carry, and harakeke rendered in that colour felt like it should glow rather than just sit there.

Getting There:  The process started the way most of my pieces do — selecting the glass, cutting it into its rectangular shape, and drilling the hole at this stage too, so the edge has a nicer finish once it's softened and rounded in the kiln. This is a key point where breakages are likely to happen. And winter is not a good time to cut glass — the cold seems to make the glass more brittle and twitchy. It's easy to have your two perfect rectangular pieces of glass break when you're drilling holes into them, too. Holes need patience, patience, more patience and a smidgeon of over confidence. Oh yes — they also need water, which is just lovely in the depths of winter.

Then I select the image I'd like to make in the glass. For this piece I use a technique called kiln casting — I draw lightly onto a heat-resistant piece of fibre blanket. Next, I cut the shape, and at this point I can play with the design — laying out the shapes, working out where each line needs to sit, and at what depth, so the composition reads as a single plant rather than a scattered collection of shapes. Getting the leaf shapes right took longer than I expected. Flax leaves look simple until you try to draw them convincingly — that particular taper, the way a leaf folds back on itself, the way they overlap without looking cluttered. I cut, position, consider, and cut more than once before the layout actually feels right.

Firing brought its own challenges, as it always does. Every glass type and colour behaves slightly differently, and you get used to the ones you work with most often — but getting the depth of colour and the surface texture to read the way I wanted still took some adjusting. There's a real risk with a piece like this: do I want the fine lines separating each leaf, or do I let them soften and disappear into the amber? Push too far the other way and it ends up too harsh and graphic. Finding the balance takes a bit of back and forth, and a fair bit of experience — because, as always, you don't really know until it comes out of the final firing.

What Went Sideways:  Nothing about this piece was too difficult, and most things went to plan, once I got past the drilling stage. During laying the leaf design and detail work, a piece shifted slightly as I placed it in the kiln, and I had to lean in carefully to adjust it without pressing on the fragile parts of the kiln. I've made a few similar designs and knew roughly how it was going to finish up after firing — subject to the whim of the 'kiln gods' — so that made it a lot easier. That's fairly typical of how most of my pieces come together — less a straight line from idea to finished object, more a series of learnings along the way, until you have the technique and style you wanted, and the kiln schedule which brings it all together.

One other piece of the puzzle I haven't gone into too much is the trouble with fibre blanket. For a start, it needs careful handling — it contains carcinogenic fibres, so a mask is essential when cutting or working with it. Another problem is that while it is heat-resistant, it disintegrates easily, so this carefully planned design is very much 'once and done' — hard to keep and reuse across multiple pieces. I'm using a 1mm-thick fibre blanket, which doesn't stand up past one kiln firing, but creates a good form and is enough to allow the light through the glass.

The Finished Piece:  When I open the kiln at the end of the firing, I don't really know what I'm going to get. This piece came out of the kiln as fired panel that does exactly what I was hoping for: harakeke rendered simply enough to read clearly, but with enough movement in the leaf shapes that it doesn't feel static. Seemingly lit from inside, the amber genuinely glows, and the leaves seem to catch and hold the light rather than just sitting in front of it.

I don't think any piece ever turns out exactly as first imagined.  But with practice you can predict what will happen. The gap between the original idea and the finished piece is usually where the interesting things happen, and I'm happy with this one.

Made by hand. Made to keep.