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The Bay Area Glass Institute

The 2001 Great Glass Pumpkin Patch @ MIT was produced jointly by the MIT Glass Lab and the Bay Area Glass Institute (BAGI). BAGI is a nonprofit community-access hot shop in San Jose California, founded in 1996 by MIT alumnus Mike Binnard (Mech Engineering, '96). The Pumpkin Patch was conceived as both a project to teach students about team glassblowing, and as a way to raise funds to help sustain the operations of both programs.

In April and May of 2001, fourteen glassblowers from BAGI came to MIT under the Page Hazlegrove Residency in Glass Art. They worked intensively with MIT students in teams, first teaching the mechanics of team blowing, then working in production teams. Typically, there were two teams working together in the MIT shop simultaneously, and as many as seven people producing up to 15 glass pumpkins an hour. 24 MIT students were involved in the 6-week extravaganza, and almost 800 glass pumpkins, squashes and gourds of all sizes, shapes and colors were blown. During the summer, those students who stayed in the area continued to make pumpkins in the glass lab, working in small teams.

The pumpkin sale took place at MIT from 10:00 AM to 5:00 PM, on Saturday and Sunday, September 15 and 16, 2001. A thousand handblown glass pumpkins were installed on Kresge Oval, the lawn between the Student Center and Kresge Auditorium. Pumpkins prices ranged from $20.00 to $200.00, depending on size and complexity.