Lights out.
Throw the fireman's switch and the whole yard goes black. What is left is a transformer the size of a shoebox, waiting to step the mains up to fifteen thousand volts.
Glass neon workshopWalthamstow E17Since 2009
Light,
bent
by hand.
Halide & Glow heats real glass over a ribbon burner, bends it across a chalk pattern, pumps it empty and fills it with noble gas. Then we give it fifteen thousand volts and stand well back.
Scroll. Or run the cursor over the glass, and click a puddle.Scroll. Or tap a puddle.
Chapter oneThe strike
Fifteen thousand volts, one letter at a time.
The strike.
The gas at each electrode ionises first. The glow runs inward from both ends, stutters, and catches. Scroll slowly and you can hold a letter mid-flicker.
Held.
Once struck, the sign sips about thirty milliamps and will happily run for thirty years. This one has been lit every night since March 2011.
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Chapter twoAnatomy of a sign
Nothing here is printed.
Glass.
Lead-free tube, twelve millimetres across, bent in one piece for every stroke. No moulds and no jigs. The corners are the bender's handwriting.
Electrodes and standoffs.
Each end doubles back through blacked-out glass to an electrode. Clear standoffs hold the tube a hand's width off the frame, tied on with copper wire.
Raceway and transformer.
A welded steel raceway carries the leads. Below it sits the transformer and, by regulation, a red fireman's switch that can be reached from the pavement.
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Chapter threePlasma
Inside the glass, the gas is alive.
It is not a filament and it is not a diode. It is a column of gas at a few millibar, torn into ions and glowing along its whole length. Look closely and it never sits still.
- Pressure
- 12 mbar
- Current
- 30 mA
- Glass
- 40 °C
Chapter fourThe bench
Heat. Bend. Blow. Check.
Fire.
A crossfire torch softens the glass at about 850 degrees. The sodium in it flares orange the moment it is ready to move.
Bend.
You get around six seconds before it stiffens. The tube is laid on the pattern and turned in one movement. A bend is never corrected, only remade.
Blow and check.
A breath down the blow hose keeps the bore round. Every pattern is chalked backwards, because the bender works on the back of the sign.
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Chapter fiveThe fill
Five gases. The rest is chemistry.
Neon.
The only gas that glows this red, and the reason every tube gets called neon. Clear glass, nothing added.
Argon.
With a bead of mercury it burns a cold blue. Inside phosphor-coated glass that blue becomes pink, green, warm white, almost anything you like.
Helium.
Peach, pale and warm. It runs hot and fussy, so we keep it for short pieces that sit close to the eye.
Krypton.
A ghostly lavender white. Beautiful in clear glass and almost never seen on a high street.
Xenon.
Deep violet and very dim. We charge extra for it, mostly for the patience.
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Chapter sixThe alley
Out in the wild.
Six of the two thousand. Each one strikes as you reach it. Keep scrolling: this part moves sideways.
Open Late
Lantern Row Off Licence, E17
- Glass
- 9.2 m
- Fill
- Neon, argon
- Year
- 2019
Noodles
Lucky Thread Noodle Bar
- Glass
- 21.6 m
- Fill
- Argon, pink coat
- Year
- 2021
Tarot
Madame Oriel, Marlowe Arcade
- Glass
- 7.4 m
- Fill
- Xenon
- Year
- 2017
Disco
The Glitterball Social Club
- Glass
- 17.8 m
- Fill
- Argon, magenta coat
- Year
- 2023
Flowers
Stem and Thorn, Orchard Row
- Glass
- 10.1 m
- Fill
- Argon, green coat
- Year
- 2016
24 Hr Bagels
Brickfield Bagel Bakery
- Glass
- 12.5 m
- Fill
- Krypton, neon
- Year
- 2012
Chapter sevenThe street
One street. Every sign ours.
Tallow Yard runs seventy metres from our door to the end wall. In 2009 it had one working streetlamp and a lot of rain. The rain is still here.
- Signs on the yard
- 41
- Glass, in metres
- 1900
Chapter eightYour turn
Your word, our glass.
What we makePrices from
Six ways to keep the lights on.
- 01
Shopfront signs
Designed, bent, pumped and fitted, with the transformer, switch and paperwork your landlord will ask for.
£1,450 - 02
Bespoke lettering
A name, a line of a song, a bad idea from a late night. Priced by the letter, on acrylic, panel or bare wall.
£95 a letter - 03
Repairs and regassing
Cracked tubes remade to the original pattern, tired signs pumped and refilled, transformers replaced like for like.
£85 a tube - 04
Hire for film and events
Two hundred finished pieces on the shelf, delivered in flight cases with someone who knows where the switch is.
£220 a week - 05
Restoration
Pre-war cinema fascias, pub signs and fairground pieces brought back with period glass and cloth-covered cable.
Quoted - 06
Saturday bending class
Four people, four torches, six hours. You leave with a small piece you made and a new respect for corners.
£165 a head
From sketch to switchAbout five weeks
How a sign happens.
- 01
Sketch
We draw it at full size, by hand, and argue about the kerning.
- 02
Pattern
The drawing is flipped and chalked onto a heatproof board.
- 03
Bend
One stroke at a time over the fire, checked against the chalk.
- 04
Bombard and fill
Baked clean under vacuum, then filled to a few millibar.
- 05
Burn in
Forty-eight hours lit on the rack before it is allowed to leave.
- 06
Fit
Fixed, wired and signed off by our own electrician, Dov.
The small printIn large type
Numbers we can stand behind.
15000volts at the electrodes
850degrees at the bend
6seconds before the glass sets
2314signs since 2009
30years a good tube will run
0LEDs, ever
Prices are starting points and include VAT. Shopfront work needs a site visit and, on listed buildings, the patience of a saint. Glass is guaranteed for five years against everything except footballs.
The last tubeEnquiries
Say it in light.
Thank you.
That is on the bench. Halide & Glow is a fictional workshop, so nothing was actually sent, but the sign at the end of the yard has been rewritten for you.
Workshop
Unit 7, Tallow Yard
off Lantern Row
Walthamstow
London E17 0ZX
Hours
- Tue to Fri
- 10 to 6
- Saturday
- 11 to 4, classes
- Sun, Mon
- Closed, glass cooling
Say hello
020 7946 0182
bench@halideandglow.example
Marnie Achterberg, bender
Dov Castellan, sparks
Pip, workshop dog