Hauslyfe: How to Make a Haus a Home
16 October - 22 November
New Zealand Glassworks
Festival of Design Aotearoa 2026
Hauslyfe: How to make a Haus a Home
Exhibition at New Zealand Glassworks
Hot glass demonstration at New Zealand Glassworks
Hauslyfe: How to make a Haus a Home
Hothaus presents Hauslyfe: How to Make a Haus a Home — a retrospective exhibition celebrating our work and breadth as a studio. Presented as part of the inaugural Festival of Design Aotearoa, at New Zealand Glassworks.
Words by Amanda Dziedzic
HotHaus Glass Studio, what could possibly go wrong?
Laurel and I would ask ourselves this CONSTANTLY over the last seven years, it has become our unofficial motto. It’s not bravado and it’s not over confidence, I think it is that universal feeling that what we emulate is positivity. We give it our all and we hope for the best. That really is the backbone of HotHaus, because when we started, we knew nothing about running a hot glass studio.
HotHaus started in 2019. We had been working together, assisting each other at pretty much every studio under the sun in Melbourne. We hired consistently at Maureen William’s studio in St. Kilda, once a week. We worked at Patrick Wong’s studio way out in Mordialloc, we hired at Ruth Allen’s studio when we needed to. Loz headed up to Canberra Glassworks when she had a big job on and I ran this crazy racket of driving my ute to Adelaide, working 5-6 sessions back to back with my team, then packing up the ute and driving it back to Melbourne to process in my tiny studio in Brunswick West. I did this about once every six weeks for a year or so. It was madness. I also ran a skilled team, headed up by the now head of glass at JamFactory, Danielle Rickaby and I’m pretty sure your own Madeline Prowd and Lewis Batchlar were even on that team at some point. This is how I managed to make hundreds of lights for Jardan and (what felt like) even more Yumemiru for myself. Any way you looked at it, we were crying out for studio time, this way of working was unsustainable. Both Loz and I wanted to blow more glass, we couldn’t actively chase any big jobs because we knew we would have to fit in on these tiny private studio schedules and sometimes that was not possible.
While working at Maureen’s we started to daydream about what we would want in our own studio. Good lighting, the best equipment we could afford, space and light, greenery, colour, a place you would be happy to come to work. Good design, good glass, good times. The idea of HotHaus had been planted.
In April 2019, we took the massive leap of faith and took the keys to a commercial lease in Heidelberg West. 13 Percy Street. We had done the figures, we knew what we could afford, we had ‘guessed’ at what a gas bill might cost us so we signed a lease for 4 years (in hindsight that should have been much longer but the real estate guy who did not think much of two girls starting a glass studio talked me out of it and what did I know? I still wanted a safety net if it didn’t plan out.) It is also worthwhile noting, my son, Cassius was 8 months old…. EIGHT MONTHS OLD!!!! I was well into the depths of sleep deprivation and getting to grips with being a mum, who was I to take on a commercial lease and start a glass studio?!! What could possibly go wrong? Turns out plenty, a pandemic for starters...
We got the keys, started drawing up plans for the build and we dived in head first. From the very beginning we worked on our branding, maybe subconsciously at this point, but it was important to us to have a logo, a colour scheme, a vibe that HotHaus would be known for. I can remember hiring a truck because we got a lead on free building materials, so we loaded it up, me and my buddy Ben Watts from a previous studio and we went to work. We had the vision of making pod studios surrounding the hotshop that we could then rent out to other artists. Ben pretty much single handedly built four studios that would in turn become iconic to HotHaus. I asked him if I could have arch windows on each pod, he said I can’t see why not and we ran with it (Ben ended up taking some space out the back later on. I am so grateful to Ben for both his skills and his friendship. He has helped me out so many times, I can remember the time the pot cracked for the first time, Loz was on maternity leave and he was the first one through the door. I cried. He gave me a hug and pretty much told me to suck it up mate. That I did).
So we are going about building the studio up from the ground. Foundation works,pod studios, Loz was designing the furnace, we started getting our equipment inplace. A GH, annealer and bench I’d bought from Phil Stokes years ago when heclosed his studio to move to NZ, we got the water plumbed in to the cold shop, we started the battle for the gas line that would take MONTHS but we were on our way. We also started taking on small jobs (hello x1000 tiny tiles we cast all in my Tetlow kiln…) we still hired at other studios and kept our own practices running. We had the plan to have Tom Rowney the tech at Canberra Glassworks come for three visits to help us build the furnace. Well, we got one visit, we cast the base, started the crown and then we went into lockdown for the pandemic.
We were building a furnace slap bang in the middle of the pandemic. We werestarting a glass studio in the most uncertain of times. The world seemed crazy and scary and we really had no idea what we were doing. Were we going to survivethis? Is this a good idea? What the hell am I going to do with no daycare? Turns out no one had any idea what was going on. I can remember the real estate calling us and asking “how much rent do you think you would be able to pay?” we negotiated 50%, I probably should have gone less!! It was a total grey area, everyone was making the rules up as they went along. I can also remember crying (again, there was a lot of tears in the beginning) because I had just spent a large chunk of our money on custom printed tins, they pretty much got delivered as soon as the lock down was announced).
But we did what we always do, we push on. We built the furnace ourselves, with many a late night call to Tom, a lot of FaceTimes, a lot of “I think it is supposed to look like this”, some “I’m sure it’s fine” and a lot of “it’s gonna be great.” I gotta say Loz really is the studio tech, she pretty much designed and built that furnace, I just did what she told me. Her brain is different than mine, she is a technical whizz, she’s a problem solver, she’s a doer.
She went and did a welding course, we borrowed a friend of hers’ welder, and we never looked back! So while she was figuring out the furnace, I was figuring out our identity as a studio. I had the incredible Beci Orpin design our logo, we settled on our signature HotHaus pink and we went for it.
In between lockdowns in Melbourne, I’ll tell you what went off—online sales. We started small with paperweights and they went off! We made as much as we could, still at other studios and we hustled hard to bring in income. Our packaging evolved and became synonomous with HotHaus. We started to look for stockists but really it was our own online sales that really propelled us. We even ran a furnace fundraiser to help raise some cash. It is also worthwhile noting that we are entirely self funded. I think we both put in $5k in the beginning for bond and building materials, but other than that, so far we have never taken a loan. The day we got the keys I started us an Instagram account to document the build and that also seemed to grow legs. This is also where I really honed in my skills for photography and a ‘voice’ for the studio, It was a way of connecting us to customers, clients and other glass studios. So after a huge back and forth we finally got our equipment signed off on (we joked that we were the safest studio in all of Victoria) and after months of arranging the gas meter guy we were on. The first lockdown lifted and we turned the furnace on. It was INCREDIBLE. We were SO stressed but we were doing it! I still think back to that wild time in awe. It was the beginning of years of glassblowing at HotHaus.
Not out of the woods yet with lockdowns, (we did manage by a stroke of pure luck a joint 40th birthday party at the studio which I sold enough stock online to get us a taco truck for the party) we juggled the best as we could. We became our own working bubble as we conveniently came under the governments guidelines for manufacture so we were some of the lucky few who could still work. I have no doubt in my mind that this saved me—personally, mentally and physically. Such a dark time for so many, we were so lucky to have each other. We focused our efforts on making beautiful, colourful glass and our online following ate it up.
We made paperweights, we made limited edition vases for Mother’s day, we madelighting for local designers including CocoFlip, Len, Southdrawn and the big fishthat was Jardan. I had a working relationship with Jardan in the hayday ofhomewares for around 10 years. In that time I designed and made hundreds oflighting and homewares. Each year I would design and make a custom line forthem. Pretty incredible when you think of it. We also began our love affair with theChristmas bauble. In 2019 I think I made our first run, I just wanted to make gifts for Cass’s daycare educators. Safe to say everyone LOVED them. Since 2019 we have made thousands of Christmas baubles. Each year we release new colourways, some years we have gotten them professionally shot. We always release them for preorders to give a little cash injection for the studio and we run with it. These little items have been loved by so many. We have avid collectors who buy them every year. It is amazing. We still make them to this day.
Laurel and I wanted to start our own studio because we wanted to be in control ofour own lives. We wanted to create a work environment that supported us. I hadCass in tow and then Laurel fell pregnant in 2021 with her son Izzy. The life of aworking mum is not easy. The life of a glassblowing mum is even harder. Thephysicality of it is intense. We joke that we work blowing glass all day, then gohome to start our next job, child wrangling. I don’t really know how we did it in those early days but I do know now how incredible it is to know what you can actually achieve on no sleep. It’s wild. It’s still wild! Cass is currently in year 2 at school and Izzy will start next year, juggling school holidays is another form of torture, but somehow we do that too. We do it because we have each other. What one can’t do the other can. That’s always how it’s been. I also want to take a moment, as I reflect, to mention and pay tribute to all the women working in glass with children in tow. I SEE YOU. There is a monumental gap in the arts field for women as they, traditionally are the ones that step aside to raise children. We see it in the opportunities that arise for our counterparts and we see the path that can emerge late and we want to craft a studio that supports, honours and celebrates women. We pave our own way.
A big part of HotHaus’ success is the people we have been fortunate enough tohave around us, work for us, support us. While it may just be Laurel and I at the core, we are not alone. Currently we have Charlotte Ward as our main assistant, Tantri Mustika as our studio hand, Michelle Kaucic has been at the helm of teaching our classes and from time to time we get help in from Nadia Mercuri. Over the years we have had different assistants. Two of them have gone on to be associates at JamFactory. I think we support and facilitate skills growth in essentially being a production-based glassblowing studio.We have participated in Melbourne Design Week for the past four years. We have assembled a pretty excellent crew of creatives that we are lucky to call our friends. In 2024 we launched HAUSLIGHTS via Melbourne Design Week, and this arm of the business has been kicking along solidly. We get to design and manufacture our own lighting and have been creating some solid relationships through supporters such as Interior stylist Ruby Shields. This year we embarked upon a lighting collaboration with ceramics heavyweights, Robert Gordon Pottery.
There are so many great accomplishments of HotHaus that I am just so proud of:designing the Melbourne International Film Festival awards and continuing to make to for four years and counting comes to mind; hosting our first masterclass with international artists Boyd Sugiki and Lisa Zerkowitz; moving studio to a different premises (if you haven’t had to act as the counter weight to a furnace on a forklift, you haven’t lived); managing power outages and pot cracks; creating and running a creative business—that seems enough doesn’t it? But it is now, as we come into our eight year of running a studio that I can start to see both Laurel’s and my own arts practice come back to the forefront. I personally feel very fortunate this year as I received a place in the Tom Malone show, I went to Pilchuck to TA for Keep Brooklyn and now I am here showing my work at New Zealand Glassworks. We are living our dream, because honestly; what could possibly go wrong?
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Words by Laurel Kohut
This exhibition represents a snapshot of how Amanda and I have worked together over the past 10 years. Although HotHaus as a studio formed in 2019, we had been working together closely on our own products and projects since 2016. During these formative years the dream of *one day* owning our own hotshop and studio was often discussed and workshopped between us.
The leap of faith we took to take on the first commercial lease in Percy St, was equal parts excitement and anxiety. But most importantly it was an act of trust to work together and believe in each other. That trust was cemented in the early years of the studio where we both quietly proved to each other though our decisions and actions that we always had the studios best interests at heart.
We don’t always agree with each other, but this trust that we’ve built over the years has built a mutual respect and understanding of each others strengths. We can unashamedly call on each other when we are stuck and need help and also respect each others points of view.
The work that we’ve created together for HausLyfe: How to Make a Haus a Home, speaks to this trust and the way we work together day to day. We’ve taken this opportunity to showcase the pieces that have been foundational to HotHaus through the years as well as our own current exhibition practice.
Amanda’s Yumemiru and my Foliage Vase were both developed during our separate associateships at the JamFactory and both series have stood the test of time to remain relevant to the studio today. In HotHaus’ early years Amanda was developing the Colourscape series whilst simultaneously I was finetuning the Forager vase range. Looking back it’s interesting to realise that both these products went through big evolutions during this time and I believe we both influenced each other in the creative decisions of these pieces.
When the Urchin series was developed it really felt like we were both working together to fine tune these forms. Initially Amanda’s design, we both found that she enjoyed making the short round shapes more, and I loved making the tall pieces. And that’s usually how we still make them.
HausLights also deserve a mention as the ranges we have worked together of really reflect our individual styles in a complimentary way. The lights are a core product for our studio and have been able to keep us afloat during some bumpy economic times. The Colourscape Lights showcase Amanda’s genius with colour while the Mellow pendants are a nod to my own love of beautiful classic forms.
The centrepiece for our exhibition at New Zealand Glassworks is a real sumptuous celebration of the work we enjoy making as a team. The vases, the platters, the cascades of fruit and foliage are all intended to draw you into this joyful display of sharing what we love to do together. Which is create Good Glass, Good Design and Good Times.
Welcome to our Haus. Please, make yourself at home.
