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I make a lot of gifts for people. Giving the
gift of stained glass often means commissioning a unique artwork that
will instantly become a family heirloom. A stained glass gift can also
commemorate an event or a milestone such as a wedding, a birth, or even
a promotion.
When clients have particular desires concerning a possible stained
glass gift, I try to accommodate their wishes. Some clients, however,
are very open to my suggestions concerning this gift. When that
happens, I usually suggest that a gift of stained glass does not have
to be a large artwork, and that I can often achieve the clients desires
in a small stained glass artwork. This not only reduces the price of
the stained glass (although small does not always mean
inexpensive), it also reduces the shipping costs.
Stained Glass Gift #1
In the spring of 2017, I made two small stained glass gifts almost back
to back for two different clients. The first project was to
be a gift for a woman who had lost her husband and was using
art therapy as part of her healing process. She had apparently done
some coloring in coloring books, and her friend (the client) wanted to
turn one of the colored-in drawings into a stained glass.
 At
the right is the original image he sent me. > >
>
To stay within his budget, we agreed that I would
crop the image so that the artwork would require less time to make. I
started by showing him the image below, which shows
four different
ways I
could crop his image with each one of the four fitting into one
of the cnc-routed wood frames I keep on hand for projects like this.  He
picked the one he liked
best, the third one from the left.
In the end the one he picked,
including shipping, went over his budget by about
$100, but he was happy to pay the price when he saw how nice the
artwork would
come out.
The finished stained glass gift > > >
Stained Glass Gift #2
 Soon
after I
completed the butterfly stained glass gift, I was contacted by a man
who wanted to know if the photo of he and his wife on their tandem
bicycle (> > >) could be done in stained glass. I
said it could, and we
discussed how the stained glass might look and what it might cost.
Once
again, I suggested keeping the artwork small. The intricacy of the
photo he sent meant that some parts would be left out and some would be
abstracted or stylized. This, too, would help to keep the price
reasonable, both in the artwork and in the shipping.
Along the way, I suggested that lettering (vinyl graphics) might make
this artwork particularly meaningful. He liked the idea, so for $50 more we added
the lettering you see in the final artwork below...
<
< < The finished Stained Glass Gift
And the tearful, happy recipient > > > 
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