Ceramics and Glass

Industrial Studies (IS) Building Rooms 124, 160, 165, & 166

For Ceramics Lab Hours – contact

Tim Straubing, timothy.straubing@sjsu.edu, Instructional Support Technician

The entirely revamped and expansive 10,000 square foot ceramic facility includes three spacious classrooms for instruction in sculpture, wheel throwing, and figure modeling. Our wet/dry glaze lab has full particle ventilation, and connects by rollup doors to an outdoor enclosed kiln yard. 

We have 11 gas kilns ranging in size from 10 c/ft - 50 c/ft (including fully-programmable Bailey shuttle kiln, car kiln, raku, and soda kilns) as well as 11 electric kilns (test, oval, round, and front loading). An additional 5,000 square foot outdoor courtyard provides space for a variety of projects, events, and experiments, and a separate plaster mold-making and slipcasting room is equipped with a mold library and Slip-O-Matic mixer. Additional equipment includes a new Potterbot ceramic 3D printer, a full-color digital Ricoh decal printer with a designated workstation, 450 lb. clay mixer, sandblaster, spray booth, extruders (including pneumatic), and slab roller.

Industrial Studies (IS) Building Rooms 234, 234A, 235A, 237

For Glass Lab Hours – contact

Tim Straubing, tim.straubing@sjsu.edu, Instructional Support Technician

San Jose State has a well-equipped hot shop with two benches, one clear 400 lb. Wet Dog Glass furnace, two new glory holes, and three large annealing ovens. The hot shop also has a large pickup oven, garage, powder booth, pipe cooler, and pipe warmer. We have all of the required hand tools and equipment for blowing and sculpting including acetylene, propane and MAPP gas torches.

The cold working area includes two silicon carbide grit wheels, one diamond wheel, a belt sander, polishing wheels, tile chop saw, cold glass lathe, band saw and a pneumatic water-fed angle grinder. A cabinet sandblaster and an old school hot glass sheet roller are also available.

We have a glass casting facility that includes a plaster-silica mold room with vent hoods, wax area, and a flat glass area for preparing fusings and slumpings.  Our kiln area includes two fusing and slumping kilns and five casting kilns, varying in size.  We also have a sand casting facility set up a few times a month for students to work through ideas and ladling projects