Melanie Galloway’s new Smashing Art Studio in Stanwood allows the customer to be the artist — transforming pieces of smashed China plates or colorful glassware into imaginative, creative mosaics and art pieces.
The art is only limited by the imagination, Galloway said.
“Pieces can be made by putting plates or mirrors or other glass under a towel and hammering them into pieces,” she said. “Afterward, for one example, they’re applied to heart-shaped molds that I make. Each person’s finished design is always different, of course. The mold has a rod attached so the hearts can be used to decorate gardens or yards, for instance.”
She has a grinding machine and glass nippers for shaping the pieces and polishing their edges. An epoxy is used to apply them to shaped molds, picture frames or whatever the artist is using for their final product. The finished artwork can include a mixture of dinner plates with patterns and varied colors, jewelry, stained glass, tumbled glass, stones, beads, seashells, ceramics or a variety of other media.
“It feels like a slow process sometimes. Some pieces take only hours, others may take weeks or even months of planning for yard sculpture, murals or other artwork. But people feel it’s worth it,” she said. “One woman wanted to make a peacock with pieces of colorful glass. That’s about a four-month process of planning and creating, but it teaches people patience and imagination in creating their finished product.”
This summer she plans a class for making artwork “with country fun, mosaics such as lighthouses, with the light shining on the water,” she said.
Her studio provides students with a place to learn new techniques, stretch their imaginations and receive guidance in assembling what often tends to be challenging projects. The process is like creating your own puzzle pieces to make whatever you want the picture to be at the end.
“I have a huge imagination so this studio and the smashing glass technique is a perfect fit for me,” said Galloway, who lives on north Camano Island. There are many artists on the island, she said, but none of them doing this type of work.
One of her customers at the studio, Betty Stover, donated stained-glass and other supplies for classes. People stop by for classes or to work on their projects a few hours at a time.
“Some people like to make tulips or colorful daisies with pieces of glass from broken pottery, colored glass, whatever matches the colors or shapes needed,” Galloway said.
Her background for creating and teaching artwork techniques comes from her interior design classes at Bellevue Community College years ago, inspiring her to design her home from the floor up, with special motifs for each of her four children’s rooms. She also made bathroom mirror borders with seashells and antique fishing lures. Friends began asking her how to make art like that and urged her to start her own art studio.
Along with her studio work, she’s now specializing in commissioned projects and competing for commercial projects.
For more information, contact Melanie Galloway at Smashing Art Studio, 10026 27th Ave., Stanwood, a block north of Highway 532, call 360-391-4628 or visit Smashing Art Studio on Facebook.
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