By JESSE GRAHAM
WHEN a loved one passes away, one of the questions that comes up within the family is what to do next – bury or cremate?
If a family member is being cremated, then there comes the matter of what to do with their ashes – scatter them into the wind or keep them in an urn?
A Healesville glass-blower has a solution to the dilemma which, he said, allowed for a more personal touch to be given to the death of a loved one.
Tim Bassett, of Healesville Glass Blowing Studio, said he was approached six years ago by a client who wanted to encase their grandfather’s ashes in a small glass piece.
The result, he said, was multiple glass pieces encasing some of the ashes, including little portable ‘memorial stones’.
“We got such a lovely response from the people we did it for, we decided to offer it as a service,” Mr Bassett said.
“We all grieve in different ways, and it’s one of the ways that people can memorialise someone they love and be able to hold them and take them with them.”
The ashes aren’t turned into glass during the process, but rather the ashes adhere to the molten glass through the blowing process.
“The ash just adheres to the molten glass quite nicely, and we always put another layer of glass over the top, so the ash is trapped inside the glass, not just on the surface.”
After adding some colour into the mix, the ashes can be encased in a number of different ways, ranging from larger items through to small pendants, which Mr Bassett said were currently a work in progress.
He said the benefit of having a unique glass piece was that it took away the remoteness of the traditional urns, which might be left untouched or which might not be suited to some homes.
“There was a need for people to be able to do what we were doing,” Mr Bassett said.
“The traditional urn is one of those things, we’ve all seen these in the movies – nobody will ever touch it, they’re sort of quite remote.
“They don’t suit a lot of people and they don’t suit a lot of houses – we make beautiful memorials, rather than a sombre memorial.
“It’s got to be something that suits both the person that has it and the person that it’s memorialising.”
A glass-blower of 25 years, Mr Bassett said the pieces took “an incredible amount of care”, and so they were made privately and with the full concentration of the artist.
“It’s one of those times when it’s really super important that I can get it right,” he said.
“There’s no second chance – I just have to get them right.”
As for the cost, Mr Bassett said the memorial pieces ranged from $140-$300, depending on the size and work involved in creating it.
The Healesville Glass Blowing Studio is open from Thursday-Sunday, 10am-5pm, and visitors can often watch the glassblowers at work, or speak to them to learn more about their craft. For more information, call 5962 2211.
