Anne Büscher: Glass to Be Worn

In her collection and material research, designer Anne Büscher pushes the boundaries of glass as a material. Her collection of wearable glass, presented at Dutch Design Week 2015, consists of pieces of series of unique earrings, in which also the hook is made of glass, and a dress made of delicate glass rings put together and melted one by one.

For Büscher, glass is a source of experimentation. The Maastricht-based designer began experimenting with glass two years ago. Out of these experiments grew a research project called How to Find the Unsought Finding, which consists of nearly 80 findings that came out of the experiments.

“I experimented with glass for a year and half, worked with engineers and learned how to blow glass and 3D-print it. One of the findings in the process was the glass earring, which originally happened coincidentally,” Büchner explains. “It is fragile, but I really like the idea that you have to wear it carefully, and you have to take care of them. That makes it even more valuable, because you have to be aware that you’re wearing glass.”

“The dress is like creating textile from glass. It is very flexible because each ring can move between the other, but of course you cannot stretch it too much.”

“I would like to develop the techniques and idea of wearable glass further with fashion designers,” says Büchner, who was originally trained as a jewellery designer.

“I want to go further with how can glass be a part of something wearable and how I can develop glass as a wearable object. Disciplines of fashion and jewellery are melting into each other, and I think it’s better to follow your passion and what you would like to experiment with than stick with a label of fashion or jewellery. It’s more about having a feeling for material.” •