FOUNDRY members visit The Garage Studios for glass blowing demonstration and to discuss the local art scene

On Sunday, March 8, members of The FOUNDRY (100 S. Main St.) went on a field trip next door to visit our neighbors at The Garage Studios (102 S. Main St.) where we learned how to blow glass ornaments under the direction of Tom Davis.

From noon until 3:00 p.m., FOUNDRY members took turns trying their hand at the process, which includes heating (and reheating) the piece in Davis’s Double Baby Dragon furnace.

The Garage Studios have been active in Chambersburg since 2003. They started out with a location in the square, and then they moved out to Falling Spring Road for a while before moving into their current location four years ago.

Owners Tom and Jen Davis make glass art and bead jewelry respectively, and they offer hands-on demonstrations and classes for people to try something new and make their own one-of-a-kind pieces.

Tom Davis of The Garage Studios poses while blowing a glass ornament.

The FOUNDRY and The Garage Studios have a lot in common: they both showcase the art and creativity of large numbers of participants, they both offer featured art exhibits on a rotational basis, they both offer a variety of classes and activities, and they both contribute substantially to drawing other creative people to Chambersburg’s Main Street.

In fact, the physical locations that are now The FOUNDRY and the Garage were at one point part of a single, large show room. The thin wall dividing them is The FOUNDRY’s Spotlight Gallery today.

“How exciting can a date night be when you start at The Garage Studios, go to The FOUNDRY, go down to the Council for the Arts, go to Lotus Moon, and have a Belgian waffle at Brussel’s Café.”

Jen Davis, co-owner of The Garage Studios, describing a Chambersburg art crawl

But just as no two pieces of art are exactly the same, The FOUNDRY and the Garage present different styles of both individual artistic pieces and business models in order to bring art to Chambersburgers without stepping on each other’s toes.

“I think we’re a different way to look at art,” said Garage co-owner Jen Davis who compares the vibe in the Garage’s massive space as being more like a living room than a traditional gallery. (For perspective: the space is large enough to include the entire store Gypsie, which relocated to its current location inside The Garage Studios from its former location in the square).

Tom Davis helps FOUNDRY member Elizabeth Porter make a glass ornament.

In most business sectors, being next door to a similar business is a big no-no, but since art is so personal and subjective, they have a common enemy in people not shopping locally, specifically downtown.

The hope is that by being in close proximity, they can form a sort of “art district” that is substantial enough to draw people from neighboring towns to come to Chambersburg and spend the day looking at – and buying – our one-of-a-kind pieces.

“I think you can have ten art places in a row as long as everybody approaches their business with a unique idea, you can all be successful,” said Davis. “The idea is that there are so many variations, so many colors, so much art that’s available.”

She used the example of ceramic artists: there could be ten in the same space and none of their stuff would look the same.

“It’s like a bubble that lasts forever.”

FOUNDRY member Linda Gottfried on learning to blow glass

“That’s the whole idea: to complement and not compete,” said Davis, “which is really what we try to do very gracefully with each other. The longer we’re here together, the better we do, and I think our successes can be very much hinged together because it makes the trip more worthwhile when there’s more than just one thing to come and see.”

Davis envisions downtown developing to a point where we could have “art crawls.”

“The idea then, too, is that you ramble from one to the next,” she said. “How exciting can a date night be when you start here, go to The FOUNDRY, go down to the Council for the Arts, go to Lotus Moon, and have a Belgian waffle at Brussel’s Café.”

FOUNDRY member Linda Gottfried blows a glass ornament under Tom Davis’s guidance.

Linda Gottfried, a ceramic artist who joined The FOUNDRY about two months ago, was one of the participants who made an ornament at the event.

This was her first attempt at blowing glass, and she marveled as Tom Davis moved confidently around the furnace. She understands how hot it really is from her own experiences with kilns.

“I think it’s a human reaction to be afraid of that kind of heat,” said Gottfried.

She was also impressed by the infinite combinations and shapes that could be achieved through glass blowing.

“It’s like a bubble that lasts forever,” said Gottfried. “That’s what I love about it. When you blow bubbles, you want them to last, but they don’t.”

“I would love to collaborate with Tom and do a piece that’s glass and ceramic…It’s an interesting coupling of materials.”

FOUNDRY member Linda Gottfried on cross-pollination between the foundry and The Garage Studios

While glass blowing and ceramics both require intense heat to produce beautiful, yet fragile, pieces, Gottfried keyed in on one difference in particular.

“If you think about it,” said Gottfried, “you’re using your human breath to move this in a way, so it’s hands-free, which is interesting for a ceramics artist.”

And – just like with The FOUNDRY and the Garage Studios – Gottfried is already being inspired by the cross-pollination.

“I would love to collaborate with him (Tom Davis) and do a piece that’s glass and ceramic and somehow get the ceramic inside the glass,” she said. “Because they’re both fragile. It’s an interesting coupling of materials.”