Bonnie Coordinates her Foyer with Gallery Glass

I got this email recently from Bonnie, our reader in Louisiana. She says, "My front door is already leaded glass in the mission style. I wish to paint some of the sections with colors that compliment my foyer. Are there any detailed instructions on how to paint vertically with Gallery Glass,spread evenly and remove air bubbles on a vertical surface?" I referred her to some of our posts on painting vertically and gave her some additional tips and techniques. ("Painting Windows by Vertical Method" under Window Makeovers category to the right of home page.) 

A few days later, I got this response, "You can see that the gold is just what I wanted. The Autumn Gallery Glass on the left of the panel was mixed with clear 1/2 and 1/2 and is much too orange. I painted Berry Red on the panel on the right. It is more the color--but much too pink. The light fixture that I'm trying to match is maroon--a dark burgundy."
I told her the bad news--there's no way to make a color of Gallery Glass darker. You can lighten it with Crystal Clear and you can make it into a pastel by mixing with Snow White, but you can't make it darker unless you can add pure colorants that are used to create the color. Since my office is next door to the Research Lab, I was able to obtain a variety of red dyes, some black, etc. --and sent them to her. There was a while that I didn't hear from her and thought maybe the project had failed and she had given up,

Yesterday, I got this email with pictures which I am eager to share with you."Well, Carol, you probably thought I forgot about you but here I am again. If you've noticed an upswing in the amount of Gallery Glass you are selling at Hobby Lobby in Baton Rouge IT'S BECAUSE OF ME!  Hobby Lobby must be wondering what it takes to keep Berry Red on the shelf!! I tried every combination of Berry Red and the colorants you sent. My talents are very limited in this area. Anyway every mixture was a failure. Out of frustration I put Berry Red on my door (3 coats) and every coat looked better and better. They say "less is more". In this case MORE was more!, 3 coats did the trick and I LOVE IT. Here are some pics to show the finished project. Now I am thinking of what project to take on next --considering I have all of this "extra" Gallery Glass paint!"

Ahhh, how satisying it is --when you finally hit the "sweet spot" in a project. I apologized for not telling her to put on multiple coats in the first place. That is the only way to darken a color, other than thicker application. However, when applying the paint vertically, you really can't vary the depth of application like you can when you're working horizontally. So the only way to thicken the color is to let it dry--one layer at a time and re-apply until you get the color you are looking for. As you can see, it took some time for Bonnie to get it just right, but it was well worth the effort. Her door is gorgeous and only she and her husband will know that the borders weren't "born" that way. Good job, Bonnie! Thank you for sharing your project. We can all learn from your experimentation and perseverance.