Happy National Hamburger Day!
A second tea pot water tower in Iowa.
Tea pot Water Tower in Iowa.
Illinois Happpy Face Water Tower.
The Hamburger Water Tower Project is proud to have the support of Images in Glass, Inc. as one of its business sponsors strongly invested in our community.
Images in Glass, Inc. is more than a 40-year Hamburg-based business, it’s a three-generation family tradition of creating and restoring stained glass masterpieces. Flash back to the late 1960s when Glen Albig and Patricia Ackley were fellow art students at Rosary Hill, now Daemen College in Amherst, New York. In 1970, not long after Glen earned his bachelor’s degree in etching & lithography and Pat, hers in printmaking, they married and had a son, Colin, now part-owner and he a son Alex, now in training. Pat’s mother, a librarian, had given the newlyweds a most fateful gift - a book about stained glass and a box of glass from which they started making lamps as wedding gifts.
As karma would have it, Glen hired Pat in 1979 after he was promoted into the stained glass division of an interior-exterior remodeling company. Pat became the first female journeyman glazier in New York State. When they were ready to move on, the Albigs chose Glen’s hometown of Hamburg to establish their own business, Images in Glass in 1979. They started out in a second-floor garret above Schmidt’s Garage on Lake Street until the “Snovember” Storm of 2014 that precipitated a frantic relocation due to structural damage. “There is a good side about everything that happens” as Glen wrote, and it came In the form of their current location at 5646 Maelou Drive, Suite B off Legion Drive near Camp Road in Hamburg.
A visit to their studio and workshop is a veritable feast for the eyes with more than a rainbow of backlit colored glass and Pat’s Hot Stuffing of individually fused glass usable art but don’t stop there! Be sure to take a look at the current projects in draft and taking shape laid out in pieces on the light box in the back of the studio. There you will marvel at the transformation of idea into complex and vivid work of art. As one example, the photograph of a puma and, as if by magic, its image in glass. But that’s not all! Other stained glass projects have included creation and restoration of church windows both near and far. Two amazingly intricate custom-made windows of St. Peter Canisius and St. Ignatius of Loyola were recently installed at Canisius High School. Others have been shipped to Hilton Head, NC and Tucson, AZ with installations outside Portland, OR and their windows from a closed Buffalo church that were donated to a church in Nicaragua. And, it that’s not enough (which it certainly is!), there’s the joy that exudes from the Albig family working together doing what they love, and it shows!
Studio hours are Monday thru Thursday 7:30 AM to 4:30 PM, Friday 7:30 to 11:00 AM but best to call 716/648-0333 for an appointment.
Check out our Gofund me page and please share with this with your family and friends!
Small Business Saturday!
If you haven’t gotten your Hamburger Water Tower tee-shirt yet, come on out to Staub Square on Local Business Saturday, November 30th from 10 AM to 5 PM where you can get one, or more! We’ll also be selling tickets for some great raffle baskets which will be drawn at the end of the day - no need to be present to win.
Hi everyone! Please donate to our cause by using this link! All proceeds will be going to painting the Water Tower!
Fun was had by all ages who attended the Family Fun Raiser to benefit the Hamburger Water Tower Project at Taylor Road Park on Sunday, August 11th. A wealth of gratitude extends to the following supporters who helped make it possible:
Able Table
American Red Cross
Bella Pizza
Big Tree VFD
Buffalo Brewing Company
Children’s Hospital
Cold Stone Creamery
Craft & Cork Gastropub
Dollar General
Imagine Hamburg
Kwinis of Hamburg
Kouign Cafe
Ko’s Kettle Korn
Love & Sprockets
Magpie Cards & Gifts
Masters BBQ
North Boston VFD
Office Depot
Paula’s Donuts
Red Robin Restaurant
Rotary Club of Hamburg
Shear Madness
Silver Linings for Pit Bulls
Ten Thousand Vines Winery
Tropical ice
Value Home Center
