Tips & Tricks for using No Days Mosaic Adhesives from Dan Gamaldi of Cradle of the Sun in San Francisco

   Dan Gamaldi of Cradle of the Sun contacted us to share the installation of his entryway mosaic outside his shop in San Francisco.  He underestimated the amount of time that it would take him to finish the mosaic, as he only worked on it in his "free" time; Dan generally works on commission stained glass windows for homes and offices in the Bay Area.  Over a period of four years, he really got to know the ins and outs of working with No Days Mosaic Adhesive. The approach to creating the "Waterfall City" mosaic was different than I've heard of using before. Instead of building on mesh, Dan used a base of aluminum foil prepped with No Days Mosaic Adhesive film.

Dan lined a plywood base with aluminum foil and then No Days Mosaic Adhesive film

Many of the pieces of glass he used in his design (based on "Waterfall City" by James Gurney) were small, and Dan didn't want to blow them away while heat setting the adhesive with a heat gun. So, he came up with several solutions.

For very small pieces of glass, Dan heat set the adhesive using a soldering iron.

  Among the solutions for heat setting that he came up with were: using a soldering iron for very small pieces of glass (such as millefiori), a regular clothes iron for heating small sections of the mosaic...

For heat setting small areas of the mosaic, he used an iron.

and, finally, the No Days Curing Station to heat set larger areas of the mosaic.  Using the irons and Curing Station allowed Dan to heat set portions of the mosaic without causing the adjacent adhesive to shrivel back on itself (which can happen when using a heat gun).

Dan used Streuter's No Days Curing Station to heat set large areas of the mosaic all at once.

  Visit Dan's website at Cradle of the Sun to see more pictures and read about the whole process. Below is the video of the mosaic being installed in the entryway of his shop.

To see the piece in person, visit Cradle of the Sun in San Francisco:

3848 24th Street

San Francisco, CA 94114

(415) 821-7667

STORE HOURS:

Mon-Tues CLOSED

Wed-Fri 11:00-6:00

Sat 9:30-6 (*Class 'til noon)

Sun 10:30-4:00 (*Class 'til 1)

(*Space limited during classes. Please come after class hours for sheet glass cuts)