What is sea glass?

Sea glass (also known as beach glass) begins its life as glass objects, such as bottles and jars, which then find their way into the ocean. Sometimes the glass is a result of a local bottle factory, sometimes it has fallen from ships and other times the sea glass has come from litter left on the beach or elsewhere on the coast.

Over the years, the broken glass gets tumbled and made smooth by the waves and pebbles of the sea. Some pieces may have been tumbled for more than 100 years, although 7-10 is usually long enough to produce decent quality sea glass.

As well as smoothing the edges, the action of the ocean waves also "frosts" the surface of the glass, causing it to have a unique, gem-like lustre. Good sea glass, such as the kind I use in my art, has smooth irregular edges, is evenly frosted and doesn't have any shiny spots.

Sea glass is tricky to find, but if you know the right beaches, there's plenty around for all us and, when we pick it up and use it in sea glass pictures, we're actually removing pollution from the sea.