Our hand blown glass candles, designed by us and made in England, start life as a tube of Borosilicate Glass.
All of our hand blown glass candles start life as a tube of borosilicate glass. The thickness of the glass, before we work on it is 2.4mm, which gives the candle great strength
To turn this into an oil candle, the tube of glass is first placed in the jaws of a lathe, so that it can be turned at high speed.
One end of the tube is blocked with a bung, while the other is fitted with a separate bung that has a flexible tube in the middle. The other end of the tube goes into the glassblowers mouth!
Using a fierce flame, something like a blow torch, the craftsman heats up the desired section of the glass tube. By blowing into the tube, and using carbon paddles, skill and judgement, he turns the simple cylinder into the basic candle shape.
He can then add solid tubing to make a stem, like our Byzantium, which has two solid balls of glass, and a base if necessary.
Once the lamp is complete, it must be annealed. This is a strengthening process, where the candle is placed in an oven, gradually heated to 600 degrees centigrade, and then slowly allowed to cool down. Wthout this process, a piece of glass could simply shatter at any time!