Inside the steel cone-shaped tower at the Museum of Glass is the museum's hot shop (aka artist's glass blowing studio). Pulling stats from their website: The hot shop cone is 90-feet tall, 100-feet in diameter at its base, and narrows to a 15-foot opening. It's difficult to describe (and even more difficult to photograph), so check out the hyperlink for photos...but there is a 200-seat ampitheatre, a live play-by-play announcer prowling the studio floor with a microphone in hand, and gigantic projection screen providing both close-up and wide-angle video shots of the artists at work. It's out of this world. I love it.The museum was hosting visiting artists from Australia who I'm told are quite famous in the art glass world...and who's names I can't remember without researching the website. The primary reason I can't remember the Aussies is not because they weren't talented or interesting, but rather it's because resident artist Gabe Feenan and I were busy making eyes at each other for the 45 minutes I spent in the hot shop spectator box. Other than the few brief moments I spent admiring the oddly sexy lesbian glassblowers (not a single straight woman on the studio floor...hmmm?) I was batting my eyelashes at Gabe...and I dare say he was batting right back. What a lovely Tacoma surprise.
