Sorticulture glass artist gardens with everlasting blooms

Barbara Sanderson is a glass blower who loves to garden.

It shows in her work.

She creates fantastical glass pieces that pair with lights, water and plants: fountains and exotic leaves, and twisty icicles lit with low-voltage lighting.

She loves that art in the garden can enhance the natural world. Sanderson knows from first-hand experience; she tends an acre garden at her Bothell home.

Glass art is more durable than people think and it provides year-round color, needs no fertilizer and no water.

"And in the middle of winter, you can have wonderful bright colors and warm lights," she said. "It's psychologically uplifting."

The majority of her work ends up in local people's gardens. At Sorticulture she plans to offer glass leaves in many colors and shapes; her signature icicles; and her popular fountain kits. The fountain kits range in price from $155 to $170. She also offers a line of smaller pieces with scaled-down price tags. Small leaves, for instance, cost between $30 and $45.

She suggests pairing her art with plants, rather than displaying it alone as a focal point.

Sanderson, 43, traveled a serpentine route to the art world. As a child, she never thought of herself as an artist. She studied other subjects in college and worked for several large corporations, never recognizing her atypical business solutions then for what they were: creativity.

She decided on a career change when she needed three alarm clocks to get out of bed. She opened a doggie day care business in Seattle called Fuzzy Buddies. And she began taking glass-blowing classes.

One of her instructors told her she was good, that she should continue. But learning to blow glass is a bit like mastering golf; it takes talent and time to become a pro. Sanderson would take years of classes at the Pratt Fine Arts Center in Seattle. She would work under mentors such as Michael Roco, a Seattle glass artist and instructor at Pratt, and train with other master glass artisans at the Pilchuck Glass School in Stanwood.

Now, a decade after her first workshop, she works solely as a glass artist, and her work includes a public commission at the US Bank Centre in downtown Seattle. She recently opened a studio in Mukilteo.

She no longer needs an alarm clock in the morning.