The maker
Kyle James Auffrey at the torch.
KJA Glassworks is a lampwork studio. Glass is heated, shaped, and sealed at a bench torch — not cast in a factory, not painted after the fact. Color is in the glass. The scene is built before the vessel closes.
At the bench torch.
Photo: Instagram @kjaglassworks
Torchwork
Lampworking — also called torchwork or flameworking — is close work. Rods of clear and color come up to temperature in a focused flame. Cane is pulled. Small forms — a crescent, a dolphin, a bee on a rainbow — are assembled and then enclosed so the finished piece reads as a world behind glass.
That is a different craft from stained glass, which cuts sheets of glass and joins them with lead came or copper foil into panels and windows. KJA Glassworks is lampwork: color lives in the rod, and the scene is built before the vessel closes.
The same heat makes goblets and sculpture: stems drawn thin, surfaces fumed, ornaments hung as finished objects rather than souvenirs of process. Kyle's public studio is @kjaglassworks, where new work is posted as it cools.
This site does not invent a shop address or a clock on the door. If you want a piece, write the studio. If you want to watch the work happen, follow the fire on Instagram.