Today's featured Etsy shop... Wareables by Design

Elephants Love Flowers by Wareables by Design

This mosaic was a commissioned Valentine's Day gift. A friends girlfriend has a photo of this image as a screen saver on her phone and she loves elephants and he wanted me to recreate the image using mosaic. 

The base for the mosaic was 1/2" thick masonite. I sketch directly on the masonite using pencil and then draw in the final lines with permanent marker. The next step is to cut the glass and build the image in sections. I use both glass nippers and a glass cutter to score the glass when more accuracy is needed.  

With this mosaic I started with the tusks and then moved to build the elephants. For this mosaic I used gray and black cathedral glass tiles for the elephants,  blue and white swirl cathedral tile for the sky, carnelian and jasper cabochons for the flower centers and cathedral glass for the flower petals, mountains and leaves. Iridized orange tone glass was used for the side edge of the mosaic. 

The final step is grouting the mosaic, and to be honest it is my least favorite part. It is just a messy process. For this mosaic I used a black unsanded grout. I prefer black grout for all of my mosaics as I think it really makes the color of the glass Pop.

I really enjoy working on custom orders because the piece usually has a pretty deep and symbolic meaning for the person. For instance this elephant mosaic is an image I would never have used to create a mosaic for my store. More mosaics and my blog can be found at my website/blog. 

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Wareables by Design!