Glass • Sea Glass

About This Category

Walking along West Coast beaches on Vancouver Island, you may catch a glimpse of colour in the sand or amongst the pebbles and shells that line the seashore. These beautiful frosted jewels are pieces of broken glass or pottery, each with their own story and history of how they come to be on that particular beach. Tumbled smooth by waves, water and sand, it can take from 15 to 60 years for each piece to tranform into a frosted, rounded edged treasure, sometimes called mermaid tears.

The legend goes that sea glass are tears shed by mermaids for sailors who where lost at sea. As the tears fall in the water, they magically turn into gems of frosted sea glass. It is also said, that the colors of their tears match the color of their tail.

Each piece of beach glass used in the creations of sea glass art, has been indiviually, one at a time picked on numerous beach walks over years of gathering.

The most common colors are white (clear), brown, aqua and green (many aqua and green shades found on the west coast with a slight curve may have been from a Japanese fishing float used to float their fishing nets).

Less common are pastel green, blue shades, dark and olive green, golden and dark brown.

Rare are pink, lavender, aqua, cornflower blue, colbolt and lime green.

Hardly ever found are orange, red, black, turquoise, yellow, teal and grey.