Meet Amy Glass of Broken By Design Mosaics

Today we’d like to introduce you to Amy Glass.

In 2007, Amy made her first mosaic and her passion for the art has taken off ever since. She began entering her mosaics in the Texas State Fair and has won a ribbon every year. As she collected materials, a ministry was born, My Mosaic Closet. My Mosaic Closet literally started out of a closet. She researched the art of mosaics, bought tesserae (dishes, china, tile, jewelry pieces, Scrabble letters, embellishments, etc.) and honed her artistic abilities. Amy soon realized that she needed more bases, so she started cutting out her own shapes. Woodworking connects her with her dad, who had a lifetime love of working with his hands. Using equipment she inherited from him, she treasures her woodworking time.

Every base is different, adding to their uniqueness. She loves to recycle, so she enjoys making something beautiful out of items that were thrown away & useless. Eventually, her supplies grew too large for a closet and were moved to their own room, her current in-home studio. She now has extensive supplies for every stage of the process – from wood to broken dishes to embellishments to grout. As her children move out of the house, she takes over their rooms with her mosaic supplies. Some have said that her passion has overtaken her house.

Twenty-five year ago, she earned her master’s degree in training and development. Though her audience has changed over the years, her passion for teaching has remained constant. When she first started making mosaics, her initial goal was to provide a night out for homeschooling moms. As word spread, she started hosting friends of friends of friends, and her workshops grew.

She also began hosting private groups, including women’s Bible study groups, birthday parties, family reunions, bridal showers & neighborhood groups. She has even taken her workshop on the road to women’s retreats and out-of-state groups. Amy has taught over a thousand women through her ministry, many of whom she had never met. She loves the idea of taking something broken and turning it into something beautiful. She compares creating a mosaic to how God takes the broken pieces of our lives and can turn them into something beautiful.

Owning a small art business comes naturally to Amy. She comes from a long line of artistic business owners, from her grandmother to her aunt. Over the years, Amy thought about starting a mosaic business, but the timing was never right. When she walked into the Richardson Mercantile, her eyes got big as saucers as she saw the possibility of making owning a business a reality. Through the support of family and friends, she opened Broken By Design Mosaics in September 2016.

The first thing she did was contact the Small Business Development Center (SBDC). A SBDC counselor walked her through the process and helped her create a business plan and marketing plan. Once those were in place, things were ready to go. Amy Glass lives in Dallas and is the mother of six – four grown children, one child in high school, and a 2-year old. She is supported by her husband, Rich, and loves to touch peoples’ lives. Her goal in life is to give God glory in everything that she does.

Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
As with all small businesses, BBD Mosaics has had ups and downs. My husband and I were in the final stages of adopting our granddaughter when I started my business. Being a new mom at the age of 50 has its own challenges, but add a new business and life was full of competing priorities. Building a website has been a huge challenge. I don’t speak HTML. I finally enlisted the help of a friend who is starting a website development business and my website now has a professional look.

Simple things like getting the search engines to put my website on their front page still eludes me. This leads to my biggest struggle – how to let people know about my workshops. I tried Groupon, which helped, but I want to reach a wider audience. Once someone finds me, the reviews are fantastic. I just need to figure out how to let people know I’m here. Word of mouth has been the greatest marketing tool, which is why my workshops continue to fill with new faces.

Broken By Design Mosaics – what should we know? What do you guys do best? What sets you apart from the competition?
Broke By Design Mosaics sells handcrafted mosaic art and offers mosaic art classes. The different types of products that Amy sells include mosaic wall hangings (e.g. crosses, angels, animals, butterflies, heats, etc.), specialty mosaics (e.g. guitar, silver teapot), mosaic kits, picture frames, boxes, books, jewelry and magnets, She also creates customized mosaics on request.

While Amy is an artist at heart, her real passion is teaching mosaic workshops. She offers monthly public workshops at the Richardson Mercantile. Workshop themes include animals, faith, western, cats & dogs, spring, patriotic, love, music, and jewelry. She also offers private workshops to groups of ten or more. One of her favorite parts about teaching workshops is bringing people together and building memories.

What am I most proud of? Workshop evaluations. They always put a smile on my face, especially when they add comments. The evaluations validate that I am having an impact on the participants. I love hearing how much fun they had and how pleased they were when the received their finished mosaic.

Four things make my classes unique from other mosaic classes.
(1) Wide selection of tesserae – broken dishes/china/tiles, game pieces, gems, watches, jewelry, beads, shells, letters, etc.
(2) Bases – handcrafted 100+ unique wooden shapes, custom shapes offered
(3) Instructor – fun, knowledgeable & encouraging
(4) Finishing the mosaic – instructor grouts for you – I’m the only workshop that I know where the instructor grouts for you

What moment in your career do you look back most fondly on?
The fact that I went for it and my business continues to grow. Within in the first year of business, I met my target sales, bought new equipment & supplies, expanded to a second location in the Lone Star Mercantile (Allen, TX) and participated in the J J Pearce Pacesetters Holiday Bazaar. I have money in the bank and continue to add more workshops each month.

BBD Mosaics workshop fun facts, first year in business:
2 – number of Texas participants outside DFW (San Antonio & Austin)
3 – number of out-of-state participants (AR, VA, PA)
5 – number of private groups
17 – number of workshops
36 – number of cities participants live in (from Fairview to Wills Point to Celina)
204 – number of participants

Pricing:

• $35/person for public workshop ($25/alumni rate)
• $300/private workshop (10 participants)
• $5-105/price range of mosaics

Contact Info:

• Address: 101 S. Coit Road Richardson, TX 75080
• Website: www.brokenbydesignmosaics.com
• Phone: 972-746-7002
• Email: bbdmosaics@gmail.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/broken_by_design_mosaics/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/brokenbydesignmosaics/
• Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/broken-by-design-mosaics-richardson

Getting in touch: VoyageDallas is built on recommendations from the community; it’s how we uncover hidden gems, so if you know someone who deserves recognition please let us know here.