My Creative Space

I got my supplies to make my Artbeads.com Design Partner challenge yesterday...I am so excited! I plan on toiling over this piece over the weekend...hubby is in Oklahoma till Sunday visiting his daughter.

I was planning on a Miriam Haskell-type design...her work is so exquisite!

The frosted acrylic flowers look good enough to eat...

and the frosty fire polish beads are just too sweet in this light baby pink...although in this picture they have a grey cast I could not get rid of!

Unfortunately, I'm on the bottom of the list for emails with the design challenge, so by the time I get to pick out my parts, many in the theme are sold out :( I wanted to go for vintage type accent beads in pink, blue and green. They needed to be oval shape and about 8mm to fit with the design. This was the best I could do with what was not sold out in their inventory...

There was no plain pink or green. The blue beads in the back are about the best choice. I liked the vintage shape of the pink/green beads, but the green throws it all off. I just may have to search my vintage bead stash to see if I can substitute. If you go back to the top picture, you can see how they just don't blend well. Perhaps I can use them to work up some earrings.

I'll get the pictures of the final piece up when it is done. Maybe I will even do a giveaway with the earrings!

Stay tuned.....

Colors of Fall Artbeads Challenge

As a Design Partner for Artbeads.com, I was presented with a challenge to create a piece using Pantone's fall color palate.   The choices were difficult as there were so many to choose from.  I ended up choosing Kimora Lee Simmons' interpretation of "Chocolate Truffle".   This palate is characterized with plums paired with bitter green and midnight black.  To tie in with the fall theme, I added luxurious copper.

The main component of my piece was hand blown furnace glass beads from Fire Designs in Purple.  These beads were so smooth, uniform and deliciously yummy to work with.  The inside holes vary and the purple stripes are very bold...the perfect bold statement to your piece.  Keeping with Ms. Simmons' interpretation, I added fire polish faceted beads in olivine and matte black.

To add my own interpretation of the color palate, I added copper.  Lots of copper.  I began with copper plated chain, which is a copper plated base metal chain.  I selected the Big, Medium, Small oval link chain for this piece to add texture.  Then, I wired all the beaded components with copper wire, sprinkled copper beads, copper bead caps and Swarovski 5000 crystals in Copper (which have a fabulous, fiery aurora to them)  in with the "charms" and added a couple hand wired copper loops over the chain for more texture.  For the clasp, I used a copper plated toggle and while wiring it to the chain, added a few more olivine fire polished beads.

For the final touch, as you can expect, I took a vintage button from the 1950's and wrapped it with natural brass filigree (so as not to hurt the shank).  This component was added as the focal point in the piece.

This piece will be offered in my shop just in time for the holiday season, so keep updated!

Disclaimer:
As a blogging Design Partner, Artbeads.com has furnished these supplies to me free of charge for my honest review purposes.  I have not been paid or compensated by Artbeads.com in any way, shape or form.

Artbeads Fall Challenge

Okay, so I'm a little late on this one.  It's fall now, isn't it?  Hmmmm....that went quick!

So the challenge was to create a piece for fall using Pantone's color forecast.  The choices were so hard to make.  I, of course, settled on Chocolate Truffle...loaded with rich plums and accented with bright apple green, lush black and dusty charcoal.

These are the components I chose for my piece:

I envisioned a modernized charm necklace loaded with these rich plum tube lampswork beads.  Looks like candy, eh?  For the accents, I chose these rich copper Swarovski crystals......

these bright olivine and midnight black fire polish glass beads and some warm copper beads and bead caps to tie the charms in with the chain.

Now...the only problem I'm hitting is time!  I am hoping to find time to work on this piece over the weekend as preparing my shop for the holiday season has been keeping me pretty busy for, I don't know, say 10 hours a day :)

If all goes as planned, you will see the completed piece by next weekend!

Summertime....a new piece

You may have remembered the wonderful mix of beads I received from Artbeads.com several weeks ago. Well, as you can expect, I threw in some antique mother of pearl button from my private stash. The final product is finished!

The challenge: Summertime
The materials: Glass beads and metal charms

Designing this piece was a walk on the beach...literally! As soon as I saw all the components piled in front of me, I grabbed my sketchbook and furiously drew this design. I wanted a design that captures the asymmetrical shifting ocean on the beach as well as a variety of design techniques.


One side of the necklace features Czech glass pearlized beads in emeralds and ocean blues, with hand knotting between each pearl using variegated blue/green/purple cotton. They were super easy to string with a hole large enough to accommodate the cotton (most pearls have tiny holes that are difficult to string). Mixed among the pearls are two components of crocheted Czech pressed glass beads and Vintage glass beads using the same variegated blue cotton. I have only crocheted seed beads in the past and found crocheting with the chunkier Czech and vintage beads quite fun. I even took the surplus beads not used in this piece and crocheted bracelets to match the necklace.

The other side of the necklace contains three strands to counter balance the weight of the pearlized and glass beads. Two strands of antiqued brass plated chain feature more Czech glass pearls, pressed Czech beads and an antique carved smoky mother of pearl button from my collection. Add to that a bead woven rope of antiqued bronze glass seed beads.


Together, the four strands compliment each other, and yet they stand out on their own.

The clasp is hand wired and designed to clasp in the front just above the focal, both for ease in clasping and another element of design.


The focal consists of a hand wired antique carved mother of pearl button from my collection and featuring more Czech pressed glass beads in turquoise with Picasso so that they resemble stones straight from the ocean. In reality, I had to keep reminding myself they were Czech glass beads and not actual carved stones, they were so realistic! Shift the eyes down further and you get to the main focal of the piece.


A seashell from my private collection was hand drilled to allow for a spray of ocean charms. The charms were individually wired with brass wire along with more turquoise with Picasso Czech glass beads to give the effect that the tiny sea creatures were spilling out of the shell in a wave of water. If found the charms very impressive in detail, especially the starfish.

Altogether, the necklace is a stunning piece, versatile for both casual and more formal ensembles. I'm toying with the idea of giving this to my mother. What do you think? Give it to Mom, have a giveaway or offer it in my shop?

Artbeads.com is offering tons of specials right now, so be sure to head over and be taken away into bead heaven!

Disclosure: Artbeads kindly provided, free-of-charge, the materials reviewed above within the frames of Artbeads.com Design Partner blogging program. The review of the materials in this article is based on my own honest, personal opinion of working with them. I, the author, have received no payment from Artbeads.com for this review.