Monday, July 26, 2010

"Toaster "as Art


I love to recycle old, broken vintage toasters into mosaic art. The retro profiles of the 50's and 60's are so cool. And I think this toaster might turn out to be one of my favorites.

I can't resist the puns !
I'm about "toast"!... measuring, cutting, nipping, grinding.
A toast to mosaic art!..... Sorry.

I chose working with shades of turquoise, because it's so mid century modern "kitcheny". I can still remember my mother's kitchen with light turquoise kitchen counter tops.
That was THE color ! She even had a turquoise Thunderbird convertible.

I started with a find from an antique shop. I had to really clean it out. Yuchh ! crumbs and goop from 50 years ago. Then, spray paint the rusted guts silver and tape it off and paint the old faded Bakelite a new shiny black. Cut off the old nasty fabric cord... and I'm in business and ready to mosaic.

I'm starting with stainless steel beads. It makes a nice, clean and safe edge. I like to use lots of mirror- silver and colored + Van Gogh glass is so rich. I really don't have an exact plan...so I'm just setting row by row. I found some irridized Italian Smalti from an old job and some seed beads tucked away in a jar. Perfect addition.
So.. I'll keep setting.....

Check out the mosaic toast in the background. My mosaic toasters gotta have toast....so I cut out a toast shape on backer board and mosaic it with brown and tan art glass. It's waiting to be "dremel-ed " and grouted and sealed.

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