Oct. 2-6
While all of my crazy caramel experiments were going on I was also trying to develop my own containers to pour the caramel into. I came up with the idea of creating copper forms to pour the molten sugar into, producing sheets of caramel "glass" that I then layered on top of one another to see the interaction of the different colors and experiment with the opacity.
I began with some simple geometric shapes—a square, a rectangle, and a third shape with two non-square angles. This third shape turned out to be the most compelling and allowed for the most interesting layering effects of the caramel.

In order to make the copper forms I cut thin strips of long metal sheeting, about 1 inch in width and a few feet in length. I then bent the strips of metal, using a sheet metal bender and a hammer, into the shapes I wanted. Then I drilled two holes through the overlapping ends and pop-riveted the pieces together and sanded the edges to get a smooth surface.
Along with my idea of layering the caramel pieces I decided to make a wooden block with slits cut into it at varying distances from each other. I wanted to be able to prop the pieces up and look thorough them to see what the layers of color and translucency showed in the material. This is the first block I created.



After I made a few batches of the caramel glass I decided that the block designed as a holder could be more interesting and offer a wider selection of places to support the caramel. I then designed two more blocks to be made the following week.
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