Making Triangular Spacers

Bead of the Day: "Triangular Spacers"

The Blogger wouldn't allow me either to see my followers, or to comment on other people's blogs - very distressing. And what are all these spaces between paragraphs, as soon as I publish my blog? I'll have to look into it.

Yesterday I wasn't doing much in terms of bead-making, unfortunately. Very rarely, but I get a day, that no matter how inspired and motivated I am, I just feel drained of all energy, and I can't do anything. Maybe, it's got something to do with the atmosphere, as it was raining yesterday. But today is sunny, and I'm all ready to make something great.

So todays' Bead of the Day is Spacer Beads. Talking about spacers: I find it quite hard to make these lovely tiny thin spacer beads which are so popular at the moment. As I found out of experience, I have to make a really very thin disc, and then quickly heat it on each side (literally, almost to pass it through the flame, the heat should be minimal), but of course I have to be careful not to overheat it, because this is when the problems start! With overheating the bead immediately becomes thicker, loses its "thin loveliness" (ha-ha! this sounds ridiculous!), and if I am completely unlucky, it becomes lopsided. Then there is only one remedy - to add more glass, but in this case forget about the spacer being thin, it'll be just like a normal plump bead, only smaller.

So! I've come up with this brilliant idea - brilliant for me, because, I have to admit, more often than not, I bugger up these little thin spacers and instead get normal small beads. And what I do when this happens is I take my marver and turn the round bead into this pretty triangular one. In my book I remember writing about square spacers - ooh, this was AGES ago, I mean, two years ago - everyone who does lampwork knows that two years means a lot in terms of your development as a lampworker. And I have to say, square spacers are actually trickier to make, as they require both pairs of four sides being parallel. With a triangular shape, however, you don't have to be so precise.

I just love them! And they have been selling quite well in sets, so hopefully, my customers love them too!
"Atlas" bead set with triangular spacer beads on the ends

Lilies and Petals, Planets and Implosion

Bead of the Day: "Planetary"

Yesterday was spent developing this new design. These beads are tricky to photograph, because there is so much going on inside - they are the ones for "gazing into", if you know what I mean. There are bubbles around the top and the bottom (you can't see those in this pic), there is a core with a lovely "lily" design and a band of silvered ivory and goldstone around the encased "petals".

Ah, this "lily" design... I literally spent days mastering it. The thing was, I bought this book by Karen J Leonardo, I suppose with the main purpose to check out the competition. And there it was, I think she called it "lilypad" or something like that. I'd seen beads with this design before, and if I remember correctly, Sally Carver won a competition with them recently. So all summer I tried and tried and tried, with various degree of success, but the beads produced by me using this "imposion" technique, were far from the image I had in my head. I found this technique extremely difficult.

One day I sat there, all upset, thinking hard about how I could achieve the look of the lilies I wanted. And I thought that it would be impossible for anybody, ANYBODY, to have temperature control that perfect, to get the lovely petals around and along the mandrel by only relying on the flame. But of course, silly me!, it's a different technique altogether: this one involves layers and layers of dots being covered with bands of large amounts of clear glass, heating and waiting for the dots to get elongated!

"Yellow Waterlilies" bead set, currently for sale on ebay

Guys, I don't know about you, but here it was a real revelation. So many people use this simple design in their work, and it looks gorgeous. Well, simple I say, of course I had to practise, but I also came up with some lovely colour combinations, and I have to write another blog on that.

Coming back to the "Planetary" design, I did use a little of the "implosion" technique here: I made a core of ivory, then created a disc out of clear on one of the core's ends. Then I used Double Helix Ekho for the dots to go onto the disc and melted them: Ekho on ivory here gives this great organic palette that I like so much, and you don't have to spend time reducing it either. Encased, put some goldstone and silvered ivory around with dots of Double Helix Calipso on each end, made indentations for future bubbles, encased again. Every technique comes handy!

New Beginning

Bead of the Day: "Dogdaisies"

I've decided to start again after so many months of not writing anything. There's been a lot happenning, just like, I'm sure, with everyone: you get up in the morning, you live through the day, evening comes, you've done your work, you've sent your emails, you've spoken to your family. Every day seems to be the same, but it's not, every day brings something amazing.

So to re-cap what's been happenning: my children have finished school, having had A level exams, and now they will be going to uni very shortly - hopefully, I'll keep up with my blogging, so you'll hear all about that. We've been to Russia for a couple of weeks, we could only go for a short break this year as we had to get back for the "Results!" day; we stayed at my parents datcha (a little country house) near Moscow. I've been posting on FB here and there, I even managed to upload some pix. I've sent off my entry to the gallery section of "The Flow" magazine in US for the annual "Women In Glass 2011" issue together with some info about my book, but I haven't heard anything from them, so I'm not sure if it'll make it into the mag. I've also sent an entry into one of the competitions in a British mag, but I don't think I'm allowed to blog about it just yet (sad face). I've started putting some beads into my etsy shop; I thought I might as well since I've got it. We are just about to start looking for a new home, as the rent on this house in Derbyshire is coming to an end and I'm very much looking forward to going somewhere else!!! (a very happy face).

These seem to be the major things. I've been making loads of beads, though working in the conservatory in summer turned out to be not such a great idea: when it's warm, it's really hot in there, and opening windows only helps a little, as the wind goes everywhere, including around my torch, I lose control of my temperature etc. - you know. Also I had to move my "station" to stand at a different angle to the rising sun: why do we put conservatories on the sunny side of the house? It's silly, honestly: too hot and too bright, you have to put on sunglasses and a bikini to be there. So I'm really happy now with the autumn coming, as it means one thing: more bead making!

I've also decided to start this new thing: Bead of the Day. I've pinched the idea from Rod's agent; he does "Mood of the Day". So I suppose my Bead can reflect my mood to a certain degree. And today it's "Dogdaisies" (not one, but a couple of beads) - my very new design, though this particular set has already been sold. Bright yellows and whites, dots of green and lots of tiny bubbles to put a smile on everybody's face.

Busy, Busy!

So busy, that's how it's been, and that's why I haven't posted anything since my blog after Moscow. I've been making the prize beads for the GBUK competition and more jewellery to send off to Cooper Gallery in Barnsley.

I remember writing about the prize beads before. The idea then was to make them of a design from my book, and I already had half of the planned number of beads made (even with my oxycon playing up all along!). I thought that a set of beads would probably be better than one focal: I make various types of focals, and people like different things. But with a set, even if the person who wins them doesn't like them, she or he can always make a couple of pieces of jewellery and sell them and get some money - an incentive to participate in the next year's competition!

When I got back from Moscow I found out that I had been awarded the Dan Klein Travel Bursary by the Contemporary Glass Society (CGS) worth £500. It was amazing news! I planned to go to Japan to learn how to make tonbodama, traditional japanese glass beads, in order to write a book on the methods and designs associated with them. A couple of days later we saw the terrible events in Japan... But I'm still determined to go there this coming summer.

So Rod suggested that I make tonbodama beads as a prize for this year's GBUK Bead and Jewellery Competition taking place at Flame Off (8t-9th April). What a great idea! The only thing is, it takes me about 40 minutes to make one of these beads. The most difficult part is to make the shape. When I wrote a tutorial for the book, it simply read "Make a barrel-shaped bead". Of course, to make a nice plump barrel-shaped bead, with "dimples", with a slight curve... is a tutorial in itself. I should actually write one with step-by-step pix, as I have by now figured out how to make this shape quicker, but still it takes time. Then, there is the division of the surface of the bead into three parts for three flowers. The next thing is to make sure there aren't any signs of pulling left - so you need to flame-polish really well. The last difficult bit for me is right at the very end: to reduce the accent dots of the Iris Dark Blue reduction frit stringer, because if you leave them just a touch longer in the flame, the beautiful porcelain white surface of the bead goes yellow or even brown-black within a tenth of a second, and the whole bead goes to the bin!

But here they are, sent off and received safely yesterday by Charlotte, our Chairwoman:



I have to say that I've improved, and now it takes me about 30 minutes to make one.

I've also sent off my entry to the bead competition, but although I'm really excited about the bead I've made I am not allowed to blog about it, so it'll have to wait until the middle of April!

From Russia With Love!

Helloooooo, I'm back!

This was Moscow a couple of weeks ago, out of the window of my parents' flat:

As you can see, it was all covered in snow. Actually, this was when the snow started melting! My parents' apartment looks out to a kindergarten, it's a shame it was a bit too early when I was taking this pic, as you can't see the kiddies - they are so funny in the snow! The problem is, they just have a good time and enjoy themselves - winter is a wonderful time, you don't get mucky, just a little wet, but it's not a problem, you go inside and put your coats, hats, gloves and boots on the radiator - until the afternoon. This kindergarten looks lovely in the evening, when the street lights are on, it all looks so mysterious... Twilight used to be my fave time of day.

Apparently, the week I arrived was the coldest they had for the whole winter, temperatures going down to -25C during the day and below 30 at night. I was lucky I'd taken a proper winter coat with me, but I forgot to take a hat and I had to borrow my mum's spare pair of fur boots, as my Doc Martins just weren't cut for that sort of temperature. When you live in England, you tend to forget how cold it is out there in the world and what people have to cope with every day.

And this is the road to Domodedovo, where I landed and where I was taking off:

Domodedovo is OK, nobody can enter without their documents being checked first, so no problem.

I've had a good trip, with most of the things done on my little list. I've seen my relatives, I've been to a 55th birthday party (this is the pension age for women in Russia, so a lot of women have a celebration), I nearly met with one of my old classmates - we'll try again next time!- and I talked to a couple of Russian publishers regarding my book which I am translating into Russian. It's all been very positive indeed.

I came home and there was some amazing news waiting for me! But I have to stop now and I'll talk about it all in my next blog.

Flame Off Prize - Please Enter to Win!

I saw an Asian glass artist talking to his glass-making gods before starting his work. Every time I want to make beads now, I come up to my oxycon and say, "Please switch on, please switch on!". Hopefully, I'll be able to take it to Tuffnells next week for a service.

Yesterday I was lucky (the oxycon did switch on almost immediately) and I managed to start on the set of beads which I'm planning to give away as one of the GBUK prizes. This year they called for sponsorship of prizes for the GBUK Bead and Jewellery Competition which will be held at the Towcester Flame Off (http://www.tuffnellglass.com/contents/en-uk/otherurl.html?url=http://www.tuffnellglass.com/contents/en-uk/d65.html) in order to popularize British handmade glass beads. For entry requirements and to download the entry form please go to http://www.gbuk.org/pages/gbuk-bead-jewellery-competition-2011/#more-149. To enter the jewellery part of the Competition, you don't have to be a GBUK member! I decided to make some of my "Mucha" design, the full tutorial is available in my book. So far I'm pleased with what I've made:

These are bright, with orange and turquoise twisties and dots (the photo, as usual with me, has been taken in natural light). The difference between these and the ones described in the book is that I have inserted some hand-pulled murrini in the same colours, so they look even better! (It was getting too much for the book, so at the time I couldn't explain the murrini technique, but I can do it in the second volume). There are only four tabs at the minute, but I'm planning to make a set which will also include bigger lentils, and some of the beads will have turquoise or orange opaque background.

I have also been proof-reading busily, as Rod wanted to send the third part of the Demi-Monde series off to his agent by the end of Friday. When I'm proof-reading, it takes me a lot longer, as I almost pronounce mentally every word I read. It's quite time-consuming, but I do enjoy it, as I get to read the drafts of novels Rod writes! Then we discuss them, and sometimes, if I'm lucky, I even manage to give Rod a good idea for something. Or so he says. By the time he finishes with those sorts of ideas I don't recognise them, but it's even better, because he is great coming up with twists and turns in his stories.

So off to make some more beads - oxycon permitting!