Bead Arts

I’m not going to post a picture of it here, because some folks are just not going to want to see it! I entered the Ugly Necklace Contest this year, and was thrilled to be named as a semi-finalist! Yes, I made the necklace as hideously ugly as I possibly could…on purpose. And I learned a ton about the rules of good design by doing it.

The online voting has just started at the Land of Odds, the sponsor of this contest. Would you go and vote? You can vote for as many as you want, but please don’t try to vote for any necklace more than once. I’d be thrilled if you voted mine as 100% ugly, but please follow your heart…or your queasy stomach…in this matter!

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Make Art Monday!

While I was messing around with some texture plates, doing a short series of some of the things you could use them for on my mixed media art blog, Layers Upon Layers, I found an interesting way to create an inlaid look very simply:

Tomorrow for Technique Tuesday, I’ll be explaining the how-tos!

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A beautiful package of weaving threads appeared at my house, and I haven’t been able to think about much else. The colors are gorgeous, and they make the techniques of finger-weaving and micro-macrame so much easier than when you’re using the wrong materials!

So, after a few false starts, I finally came up with a bracelet that I’m actually willing to keep. It’s nowhere near as fine as the ones my friend Gladys makes (I’m hoping she’s going to give me permission to post a few of hers here soon!), but it’s passable. See my earlier post for a really pathetic attempt that had to be cut apart!

After the first flush of success had settled, I knew that I could do better, so I gathered up some lucite flowers and a stash of pink beads, and made this one:

handmade-beaded-jewelry, wearable-art, beads, beading, jewelry, mixed-media, bead-weaving

Cindy Powell recently showed me the necklace she made that was inspired by my fabric beaded Spring Fling, whose instructions appeared in the May/June issue of Jewelry Crafts. As a designer herself, Cindy is never content to merely follow the directions! See what she did with the basic idea? Among other changes, she decided to add charms to the bottom of each fabric bead, creating this wonderful Santa Fe charm necklace:

handmade-beaded-jewelry, wearable-art, beads, beading, jewelry, mixed-media

Make Art Monday!

Carnelian pendant

Tomorrow for Technique Tuesday, I’m going to post the how-to for this piece. In the meantime, gather up your broken strands of vintage beads, especially the lightweight and colorful resin ones, and start planning your color palette!

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Make Art Monday!

Not only are these pins fun and easy to make, but they’re a great way to use up your small quantities of left over beads from other projects. The mesh tops are domed, and come with a pin backing that has prongs to fasten the top on.

These close-ups make the pins look much bigger than they are: the metal frames are only about an inch across:

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Make Art Monday!

I seem to be stuck on pendants…two weeks in a row now. But this is a very different technique, and I’ll be sharing it tomorrow for Technique Tuesday!

Polyclay Frame pendant

handmade-beaded-jewelry, wearable-art, beads, beading, jewelry, mixed-media

Make Art Monday!

Pearl Dangle pendant

For tomorrow’s Technique Tuesday tutorial, I’ll be showing you how to make one of these pendants to add to a chain that you hopefully already have! These are being shown in every catalog that I’ve looked in this spring, and they won’t cost you even a quarter as much to make as to buy

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Make Art Monday!

Using beads and wire crochet, this piece uses amethyst nuggets to good effect!

Faerie Bells

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Make Art Monday!

I made a couple pairs of these this month. One pair (the lighter-colored ones on the left) immediately got wrapped up and sent off to my soon-to-be DIL, Lizzie.

I keep seeing hoops and dangles in all of the magazines. Although I don’t tend to pay a whole lot of attention to these types of trends, the dangling pearls appeal to me! I also made a pendant with a lot of cascading pearls, and I’ll be sharing that one soon along with a tutorial on how to make your own.

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Last week, I sat on my front porch in 70 degree weather on Wednesday afternoon, making this snowflake pendant. On Friday, the (hopefully) last nor’easter of the season rolled in. We shoveled up a foot of snow on Saturday morning!

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Make Art Monday!

I made this purse over the summer, but it left home for awhile to be photographed. It’s finally back home, so now I have to figure out what to do with it next!

Larger View

The beads are wired onto a cardboard cigar box, and the interior is lined with a satiny fabric. It uses some of my handmade glass lampwork beads, and purchased seed beads. Visit again tomorrow, because I’m going to share a tutorial with all the steps in its construction for this Technique Tuesday!

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Two of my articles are in the April issue of Jewelry Crafts Magazine. The first one is instructions for making a mixed media necklace like Drum Beat, shown below. It includes fabric beads, wire, and pre-made ceramic beads.

Drum Beat

The second article concerns the theme of the issue: choosing colors. I’ve used one of Jeanne Kent’s beautiful fused glass V pendants, and written a practical lesson in color theory, along with (of course) instructions for making the necklace. This poor little necklace remains unnamed. Those of you who know how name-challenged I am…maybe you can give me some suggestions?

Unnamed

Jewelry Crafts Magazine

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I know it’s the wrong time of year to be thinking about Autumn, but these are some of my favorite colors, year-round. You see, despite my profile picture with the wild turquoise hair, I’m really a redhead.

Anyway, here’s what I made with another one of those beautiful V-pendants that I got from Jeanne Kent at New Terra Artifacts. I haven’t decided whether to keep this one or to put it on one of my websites for sale. I guess I don’t have to decide right now!

Tomorrow for Technique Tuesday, I’ll give you the instructions for this one!

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Clare Byfield recently got some optical lenses from me, and I want to show you what she’s done with them! I love the way she’s added rhinestones to the surface of the lenses:

If it interests you to try playing with these, I have a tutorial available from when I taught these on HGTV. Sets of three lenses are also available.

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