Emmy Palmer Glass
Artist Emmy Palmer fuses glass blowing with knitting to create beautiful items for the home.
Emmy Palmer started out in the craft world by undertaking a National Diploma in Design Crafts in Somerset, then moving on to complete a Foundation Degree and BA Honours in Applied Arts at Plymouth Arts University. “I specialised in glass blowing between 2004 and 2007, and received a scholarship with Teign Valley Glass Studios in Bovey Tracey in 2006,” she explains.
When Emmy left university, she was already set up as a business and continued to work as a glass artist before taking some time away to concentrate on her young family. “I then returned to glass in 2021 by appearing on Dom Chinea’s pilot BBC series, Make It At Market, where I was mentored by an expert glass maker. My business has since gone from strength to strength.”
Emmy continues: “I design and make a variety of blown glass that I combine with knitting, which really started as an experiment. I was initially combining the glass and knitting by creating cosies for the outside of the glass using different materials. This led me to find ways of burning those textiles away in the hot glass-blowing process, to leave residual patterns. Somewhere among this, I started experimenting with oxides and different metals.”
Why the combination of glass blowing with knitting, specifically? Knitting and crocheting are skills that have been passed on through the women in Emmy’s family. “When I think of my little nanna (my mum’s grandmother), I see her sitting in an armchair with a hook in hand and the crochet blanket that she is masterfully creating, at the speed of light, draped over her lap,” she recalls fondly.
“My mum has a little collection of wobbly pieces that beautifully illustrate my journey to refining my technique of encasing knitted wire into blown glass. I also use my open lace knits as templates to create some of my work, so it appears as if knitting is suspended in the blown glass when in fact the original piece of textile is no longer present,” she adds.
Living on the outskirts of Plymouth, on the edge of a woodland, Emmy has recently set up a small, cold studio in her garden shed, where her cutting and polishing work takes place. She also has a little pink summer house for other “creative bits” and packing. As glass blowing involves some large industrial equipment, she does this at several glass studios, including Teign Valley Glass Studios in Bovey Tracey (her main hire), Fire Work Glass Studio near Totnes and the Dartington Crystal Visitor Centre in Great Torrington.
Emmy finds inspiration close to home. “I’m in love with Plymouth and its surrounding areas. It really is the most beautiful, creative and inspiring place to live. As a family, we spend a lot of time in nature. With so much to choose from here, we feel very lucky.”
Emmy Palmer Glass
Artist Emmy Palmer fuses glass blowing with knitting to create beautiful items for the home.
Emmy Palmer started out in the craft world by undertaking a National Diploma in Design Crafts in Somerset, then moving on to complete a Foundation Degree and BA Honours in Applied Arts at Plymouth Arts University. “I specialised in glass blowing between 2004 and 2007, and received a scholarship with Teign Valley Glass Studios in Bovey Tracey in 2006,” she explains.
When Emmy left university, she was already set up as a business and continued to work as a glass artist before taking some time away to concentrate on her young family. “I then returned to glass in 2021 by appearing on Dom Chinea’s pilot BBC series, Make It At Market, where I was mentored by an expert glass maker. My business has since gone from strength to strength.”
Emmy continues: “I design and make a variety of blown glass that I combine with knitting, which really started as an experiment. I was initially combining the glass and knitting by creating cosies for the outside of the glass using different materials. This led me to find ways of burning those textiles away in the hot glass-blowing process, to leave residual patterns. Somewhere among this, I started experimenting with oxides and different metals.”
Why the combination of glass blowing with knitting, specifically? Knitting and crocheting are skills that have been passed on through the women in Emmy’s family. “When I think of my little nanna (my mum’s grandmother), I see her sitting in an armchair with a hook in hand and the crochet blanket that she is masterfully creating, at the speed of light, draped over her lap,” she recalls fondly.
“My mum has a little collection of wobbly pieces that beautifully illustrate my journey to refining my technique of encasing knitted wire into blown glass. I also use my open lace knits as templates to create some of my work, so it appears as if knitting is suspended in the blown glass when in fact the original piece of textile is no longer present,” she adds.
Living on the outskirts of Plymouth, on the edge of a woodland, Emmy has recently set up a small, cold studio in her garden shed, where her cutting and polishing work takes place. She also has a little pink summer house for other “creative bits” and packing. As glass blowing involves some large industrial equipment, she does this at several glass studios, including Teign Valley Glass Studios in Bovey Tracey (her main hire), Fire Work Glass Studio near Totnes and the Dartington Crystal Visitor Centre in Great Torrington.
Emmy finds inspiration close to home. “I’m in love with Plymouth and its surrounding areas. It really is the most beautiful, creative and inspiring place to live. As a family, we spend a lot of time in nature. With so much to choose from here, we feel very lucky.”
.jpg)
