The Boro collection explores light, transparency, and playful interactions. It is made of low expansion glass which can easily handle thermal shock ranging from freezing to high heat.
For many years, Martin has been intrigued by challenges associated with glass forming on a small, artisanal, production scale. He developed the Boro collection while exploring non-traditional manipulation of borosilicate glass, an ongoing project started some 10 years ago.
The original goal was to simply create a depression in a flat pane of glass. The key element of the presentation was asymmetry, which was also the main sticking point when it came to manufacturing. Conventional techniques produce revolved, symmetric shapes while slumping and molding with low volume production tooling usually produce textured surfaces. These are visual flaws Martin was determined to eliminate. After a lengthy trial and error process, he developed a simple flame-forming technique that enabled a clean, perfectly fluid transition between the flat plane and a bowl. We have now completed the adoption of this process for small batch production, creating our own specialized tooling. The Boro bowls are all individually flame-formed and annealed at our Chicago studio, one at a time.
