What the heck is dichroic glass?
Dichroic glass is the result of placing a multi-layered coating on glass using a highly technical vacuum deposition process. Quartz crystal and metal oxides are vaporized with an electron beam gun in an airless vacuum chamber. The vapor then floats upward and first attaches then condenses on the surface of the glass in the form of a crystal structure. The glasses we use have as many as 30 layers of these materials yet the thickness of the total coating is approximately 35 millionths of an inch. The coating that is created is very similar to a gemstone, and careful control of the thickness creates different colors. Thus, all the colors are created using the same exact materials. Originally created for the aerospace industry, dichroic glass is now made available to the artist community through several specialty manufacturers. We use only dichroic glasses manufactured by Coatings By Sandberg,Inc. (CBS). CBS dichroic glass is specifically designed to be hotworked but it’s just as beautiful
