Which onboard activities would you recommend?

[rjscott]

Elena is correct; the temperature in the furnace is at least 2100 degrees. My husband is a glass engineer and he was very impressed with the Hot Glass show on the Equinox. Unfortunately, we must have been at the one show where they did not raffle off a piece that they made. :( But, we enjoyed the show nonetheless. :) They have many pieces displayed throughout the ship and they are all works of art.

[elena7seas]

Elena is correct; the temperature in the furnace is at least 2100 degrees. My husband is a glass engineer and he was very impressed with the Hot Glass show on the Equinox. Unfortunately, we must have been at the one show where they did not raffle off a piece that they made. :( But, we enjoyed the show nonetheless. :) They have many pieces displayed throughout the ship and they are all works of art.

 

What an interesting occupation...glass engineer. I'm amazed at what they do with glass in architecture these days...well, I'm just amazed by engineers generally.

 

The Corning team raffled off two wonderful pieces at each of the shows I attended on Solstice. My husband was afraid that I would win one and he would have to carry it home. (He does have history to explain that fear...I made him carry 50 crystal wine glasses and a decanter through Heathrow as carry-on luggage. His arms were four inches longer when he got to the plane. Crystal is heavy!)

 

Thanks for verifying the temperature in the Glory Hole. I always think it's amazing that there is something that hot on a ship--that is there just to entertain us!

[rjscott]

Elena, my husband said the temp would be b/t 2100-2300, so you were right on. He used to work for Corning in the scientific glassware division, which made things like beakers and pipettes. He now is in R&D for a bottle maker, so think of him when you have wine or beer. :D He couldn't believe it when I told him they would have this Hot Glass show onboard Equinox. Could not believe they could have a furnace hot enough onboard a ship. He is now a believer, but he had to see it for himself. ;)

[madelinerose]

Here is a link to some pictures from the Hot Glass Show, where you can watch them make a glass angel fish. Each show is different and I love watching the artists working together. It's like a ballet.

http://leftcoasters.smugmug.com/Travel/Cruise-Ships/Celebrity-Solstice-Hot-Glass/7189941_8ps5S#461683835_2Nc8i

 

Elena, thank you so much for these photos. We've seen glass blowing many times, but not Corning. This looks very nice. ;)

[Onessa]

Thanks for the link - I probably would have not gone to the show but now I will!!

 

Yes, not to be missed. We had been up on the lawn the first day of the cruise when the hot glass crew was just getting some stuff ready and doing some "practice" work -- just that got us hooked!

 

What an interesting occupation...glass engineer. I'm amazed at what they do with glass in architecture these days...well, I'm just amazed by engineers generally.

 

One of the artists on the crew on our cruise was a Corning Museum of Glass employee -- while on the ship he did some amazing blown glass, his cohorts indicated that his real area of expertise was "flame thowing" (a different type of glass art) -- it appears that he was at one time the Lead Flame Thrower at CMOG. Now THAT would be a cool title to have on your business cards "Lead Flame Thrower"! :D

 

The Corning team raffled off two wonderful pieces at each of the shows I attended on Solstice. My husband was afraid that I would win one and he would have to carry it home.

 

DD won a fish (if you go to CMOG face book page, Brenna Baker has a photo show with DD's fish as the "front page" picture) - the piece is entitled Reef Racer.

 

DH DID have to cary it home -- we bought some natural sea sponges to protect the fins and wrapped it in t-shirts and he toted it from Rome to Milwaukee in his carryon backpack. It made it home in one piece and is now on a bookshelf in our living room.

 

BTW I loved the pics posted. Surprisingly, although we attended nearly every show, I only took pictures one evening -- fortunately it was when Brenna made the piece my DD eventually won! I guess it was fate.

 

My FIL passed away the day after we returned home and I didnt have a chance to even look at the pics until about a month after we came home -- you can imagine how surprised I was to find I had about 75 pics of Reef Racer being created -- from initial gather, through shaping and into the anhealer (sp?) -- including some great shot of it in the glory hole.