For the fifteenth year in a row, the Palo Alto Art Center hosted the Great Glass Pumpkin Patch. Over thirty glass artisans displayed 8,000 hand-blown glass pumpkins.
It's always overwhelming at first when faced with the deluge of pumpkins.
It was just as difficult as choosing a favorite in a candy store.
In the end, my personal favorites were the opaque green gourds by Leonoff Art Glass featured at the top of this post. With their big, plump, rotund shapes and the satin sheen finish, they looked like they were harvested at their peak.
This translucent, smooth gourd was also by Nick Leonoff:
Nick Leonoff's art is currently on exhibit at the Masaoka Glass Design Center in Carmel Valley, California through November 20, 2010.
There were other treasures. Ken and Ingrid Hanson combined their Swedish and Italian aesthetics to produce this blue iridescent wonder:
They also produced some medium and small-sized pumpkins...
...and these were just born:
The Hansons also made wonderful pumpkin teapots:
Gathering Glass Studio created this unusual matte-finish blue gourd with green speckles...
...and this black and white op art:
Gryphus Glass Company brought green to a whole new level:
The huge clear pumpkin by Avolie Glass was big enough to carry Cinderella to the ball:
The mice could go in this one:
There were others with unusual "rinds", like this orange and black one by Jon Love Art Glass. I wish I thought of trying to buy this one for my friend Stephanie, who is a Princeton Tiger.
I was out of town the day of the sale, so it wasn't an option. Just as well, because it would have been difficult to part with it, given that it happens to be dressed in the team colors of the awesome San Francisco Giants.
Speaking of the Giants, just one more win and we go to the World Series! Good luck to Jonathan Sanchez tonight! Go Giants!
