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Ellie Durham-Britton

Specialty:
I am a stained glass artist who makes products ranging from decorative to functional. For my stained glass work, I use primarily the Tiffany method with an occasional traditional leaded method piece, and I often incorporate fused glass techniques, found objects, and natural materials such as ammonites and agate slices in my work. I also make fused glass dishware and decor using a glass kiln. My fused glass work includes fusible glass, frit, powders, and nontraditional fusing materials such as copper mesh and silver leaf. I also am committed to minimizing waste, and as such, all scrap glass pieces created during my stained glass and fused glass work are repurposed in mosaics and mixed media projects.

Ellie’s Biography

Ellie Durham-Britton (they/she) is one of the 2025 cohort of Craftsmen’s Guild of Pittsburgh Emerging Artists, a glassworker interested in creating elegant yet whimsical décor depicting the natural world. All of Durham-Britton’s work, by way of their business Graphite Glassworks, has an equal dose of whimsy and reverence, containing representational images emphasizing the magic found in oral folktales and the world around us. As a former geoarchaeologist, they find tremendous joy in learning about plants, animals, and rocks, and frequently incorporate natural materials such as agate slices and ammonites into their stained glass work. While much of their work explores themes such as environmentalism and natural disaster, the overarching message behind Durham-Britton’s entire body of work is to ask the viewer to more actively bear witness and give respect to the significant changes that have occurred throughout history, be they natural or cultural. In stained glass, Graphite Glassworks most frequently uses the copper foil method (the Tiffany method), which uses copper foil tape, 60-40 solder, glass, and zinc border came to follow patterns which are always designed first through pencil and paper, then translated into more precise patterns using digital software. For their kilnformed glass work, the process again starts out organic and becomes more technical and scientific; they will experiment with mixing materials such as copper mesh, vitrigraph stringers, and dichroic and iridescent glass to create more abstract, painted imagery, then use the science of chemical reactions to achieve unique textures and visual effects. Experimenting with screenprinting and powder drawing, they then slump their dishware into pleasing shapes using molds that complement their designs.
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