glass stones tutorial

This project is a family favorite. My kids *love* to “crack” glass stones with me. They don’t even make anything with them most of the time, they just enjoy watching the glass crack and then admiring their handiwork. I like to paint the stones, glitter them, set them in bezels, make magnets, and all kinds of other things. But let me back up a bit and first show you how to “crack” glass!

Project estimate:

  • Glass stones (purchased in the floral department), $1
  • Water & ice, on hand
  • Bowl, on hand

Total: $1

cracked glass tutorial

Step one: Preheat your oven to 425 degrees. Arrange your glass stones in a baking dish.

Step two: Bake the stones for 20 minutes.

Step three: Prepare a plastic bowl with ice and add water.

Step four: When you remove the stones from the oven, pour them IMMEDIATELY into the ice water. They will crack instantly.

Your stones are now ready to work with. The cool thing with this project is that the stones have cracks on the INSIDE but the outside is perfectly smooth. There are no sharp fragments or anything that will cut you. Occasionally, a stone may crack too deeply and break in half, so make several at a time.

Cracked Glass Pendant

What to do with your beautiful “gemstones”? One idea is to just set it on a bail to make a pretty, diamond-like pendant. Another is to wrap it with wire like I did in this tutorial. Let me know if you’d like to see more ideas with these stones, and I’ll post them next week!

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