Rocky Martina
Turning Glass Into Artwork
Written by Gary Gosselin | Courtesy Oakland Press
ROCKY MARTINA
After 30 Years in the stained glass business, Rocky Martina can spin panes of glass like pizza.
But he prefers to use glass to create artwork in everything from doors to Tiffany reproductions.
Much of the work is installed in residential and commercial buildings and offices, Martina said, but he and his staff also make hanging pieces, create lamps and even sculpt a three-dimensional figure if the price is right.
There's a 15-inch, 1,000-piece globe on display in the studio, a copy of one Martina made for a doctor.
The globe took about 120 hours of work.
Martina and his crew have created all of the stained glass in the theater district in Detroit, starting with the Fox Theatre.
"We just about lived there for seven months, " Martina said.
"We had crews there 24 hours a day sometimes."
Other major theatre projects included The Gem Theatre, the State Thetare, the Michigan Opera house, Music Hall, and the Masonic Temple.
A World of Glass also made the 16-panel, 20 foot round ship emblem prominently displayed on the Oakland Univeristy sports center building.
As for that Tiffany lamp. Martina said he can make a nearly exact match because of the high skill level of his staff and the fact that they have access to the same type of glass used in the original Tiffany pieces.
Work filters in from throughout the country, Martina said.
A lot of business is done with window makers Pella and Marvin.
The only problem with these jobs, he said, is that once the pieces are shipped, A World of Glass never sees where or how they're used.
When he does residential work, Martina said he has to temper the homeowners' enthusiasm.
"A lot of time, they're geeked on the glass and they want it everywhere, and I won't do it, " he said.
"One lady liked a front entryway so much, she wanted the whole front of the house, and I said no."
Martina said that when used to accent buildings, stained glass should not be a focal point but a complement to the overall architecture.
Too often, he said, people want to make it the focal point and that's when he has to cut them off, he said.
Most of the employees have been at A World of Glass for many years, he said. Dennis Phillips and Mark Brasch both have 20 years. "Between all our employee years, we have well over 100 years of art glass experience, " Martina said.
A World of Glass has a studio and production area where people can see some of the completed pieces as well as works in progress. "We have photos of projects of the last 30 years for ideas, and we can make anything you can think of - and even some you can't, " Martina said.
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