Ask Robyn Ochs why she and her husband, Robert Gage, chose to open their glassblowing studio in Hazel Park back in 2019 and the first thing she says is Doug’s Delight. It’s kind of a joke, but also not. And fair enough, really. The iconic ice cream stand changed hands in 2018 and was reinvigorated with the introduction of a second business, Matt & Mo’s Italian Beef, shortly thereafter. The menus complement each other in such a way that even in the coldest days of winter, it’s not unusual to see long lines of customers standing outside as they wait to place their order at the walk-up window alongside a busy John R Road.

There are no shivering shoulders inside Rusty Bug Studio, where a light industrial building has been transformed into a glassblowing studio offering custom works of art, educational workshops, and more. The furnaces are firing at well above 2,000 F here – and much to the delight of two street cats-turned-shop cats, Jax and Ruth.

Rusty Bug Studio is located at 1638 E. 9 Mile Rd. in Hazel Park.'Glass is all I do'

Robyn and Robert opened Rusty Bug Studio in 2019 after finding a space on 9 Mile Road near its intersection with Dequindre. From the street, it’s a wholly unremarkable building that’s easy to miss; even if you do see it, there’s little there to remember it by. Slightly set back from the street and nestled among the dozens of other light industrial buildings that line 9 Mile and Dequindre roads, Glass Bug Studio looks like it could be home to a collision shop or a small manufacturing outfit. There’s a good chance it was, Robyn says, but it was just a “big empty box” when she and Robert moved in.

“I kind of like an industrial area, so I looked more out this way than I did on the main strip” of John R, says Robyn. “I looked here, and then I looked over closer to 8 Mile – places where there seems to be more of an industrial feel but still a little ‘town’ feel, too.”

Rusty Bug Studio isn’t the only creative arts business to make use of Hazel Park’s light industrial building inventory. CJ Forge, a blacksmith and ironworking studio, offers classes and workshops from a similar building on 10 Mile Road. And the boutique guitar makers at Clay Avenue Guitars have been operating out of an old shop on John R since 2023.

[Related: Read “How this local guitar company is feeling reinvigorated by its new Hazel Park workshop” on Metromode.]

Blink and you might miss it, as they say. But even if you noticed any of them from the street, you’d be hard-pressed to imagine the creativity happening inside such buildings.

It’s creativity at work in the rawest of forms.

In the case of Rusty Bug, that means furnaces kept firing at anywhere from 2,000 to 2,400 F.

“Basically, glass is all I do,” Robyn says. “It’s a working hot glass studio, so it’s kind of its own living, breathing animal that needs tending to – constantly. Right now, I’m filling a furnace and it runs 24 hours-day, 7 days-a-week. So Rusty Bug pretty much takes up almost all of my time.”

Robert Gage and Robyn Ochs, co-owners of Rusty Bug Studio.A good space

Rusty Bug Studio operates on a number of different levels, including renting the space out to fellow glassblowers. There are monthly workshops, which offer the public a chance to get into the studio and create their own glass art alongside Robyn’s instruction and guidance. The popular events often sell out – and even weeks, if not months, in advance.

Robyn also creates her own works of art, including decorations, household items, and more. Those she sells at various shows and fairs, but from September through December, Robyn opens a small gallery at the front of the studio. The gallery is open a few days each month for the holiday shopping season; the next is scheduled from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Saturday, Dec. 28.

The studio’s most popular offerings are the glass memorials. Custom-made, Robyn takes a small amount of cremains from someone’s loved one now passed, be it person or pet, and then creates a one-of-a-kind glass memorial with it. She feels the weight of the service she’s offering, and honors that.

“I always smudge the whole area first, just to be in a good space,” says Robyn. “I’ll ask the family if the person resonated with music, ask them what they want me to play. I’ll put on the music that they liked to listen to, just trying to set the mood for the best intent of the memorial.”

Sometimes a person ordering a glass memorial asks if they can watch Robyn at work. She always honors the request, she says, but prefers to work alone on such pieces when possible. After years of teaching glassblowing workshops, she finds it hard not to explain what she’s doing when someone else is in the room. A loft space converted into a viewing balcony, she says, might be an eventual solution.
Robyn at work.
“It might be nice that I could say, yes, you can come here and watch from up there. Maybe that way I don’t feel like I’m teaching as I’m making it, because I’d rather be more in the moment with something so important.”

For all its molten hot furnaces and oddly shaped tools, Rusty Bug is a pretty cozy spot. Robyn co-owns the studio with her husband Robert, an ironworker by trade who also uses the studio for his own projects in metalwork and woodwork. Knick knacks and decorations dot the walls and shelves. And there are the two shop cats, Jax and Ruth, who have their run of the place. A small cat door leads outside but the former street cats seem to like the warmth of the furnaces just fine.

“They were both feral and they just turned ridiculously friendly,” Robyn says.

Rusty Bug Studio is located at 1638 E. 9 Mile Rd. in Hazel Park.