Glass Towers

Instructions:

1. Find lots of sturdy, 1" or thicker, glasses
2. Get a heavy duty, clear drying epoxy glue
3. Lay down an old quilt or towel or tarp 
4. Lay out the pieces in a pleasing shaped tower (from a sturdy base to a smaller top seemed to work best, at least in our experience), but horizontally so none of them break
5. Assemble two pieces at a time, using heavy duty glue (blech, we had one that smelled like asphalt)
6. Hold pieces together (if using fast drying glue); OR tape/tie/clamp pieces together gently until glue dries all the way
7. Keep assembling with glue until tower is complete and let dry completely before placing outside

Behind the Scenes:

     My mom and I have been collecting glass pieces for about a year now. We look for thicker pieces (1" or thicker) at garage sales, thrift stores, or other places where the glass isn't as expensive. All different colors, sizes, and shapes of glass- we have it saved in our garage. However, we decided to finally use it and make glass towers.


      At first, I kind of thought my mom was crazy, but the more pieces of glass I found, the more excited about the project I got. This project was fun to do, but definitely for people 16 years of age and older because of the toxicity of the glue being used and the fact that the glass might break and become dangerous shards of DOOM. However, kids could probably help out in terms of picking the order or color of glass pieces in the tower. We made four to begin with and ended up going mostly monochromatic because otherwise it looked a little too crazy (too many shapes, colors, patterns all at once.) So far, it has held up in the garden, even though it was over 100 degrees here for almost a month straight. My dad decided to reinforce the bottoms of these towers using an old bicycle tire (not as attractive an option as possible, but it worked and we just covered the bottom piece with dirt.)