Artist Bio

A graduate of the Craft & Design Program at Sheridan College with a major in Glass, Sonya Labrie has focused her career on designing and creating functional, wearable, and sculptural works in blown, kiln-formed, and flameworked glass.

 

Informed by a background in painting and drawing, Sonya explores surface design, texture, and colour as details of expression. From playful, organic interactions between colours in blown glass vessels, to crystalline surface textures in sculptural pâte de verre art pieces, Sonya’s work contains a spirit of free-form intention; a balance of precision and experimentation that culminates in joyful results. With consideration for form, texture, and colour, Sonya’s wearable glass jewelry elegantly encapsulates the cherished properties of glass and easily evokes a mood; from the soothing calm of subtle blues and greys, to the exuberant cheer of a brilliant jewel-toned rainbow.

 

Declaration of Authenticity

Each of Sonya’s pieces is uniquely handcrafted by the artist at Terminal City Glass Co-op, or in her home studio in Vancouver, BC. From beginning to end, Sonya uses age-old glass crafting processes combined with her years of expertise to carefully create her works in glass. 

 

Sonya employs a variety of techniques including glass fusing – where cold glass is heated in a kiln and “fused” together; flameworking – the melting of glass rods in a hot flame, which are then wrapped around steel mandrels to create glass beads; kiln casting – where layers of glass “sand” are heating into a mold in a kiln; and traditional glassblowing, where hot glass is gathered on the end of a pipe and formed into vessels and other objects.