What about now?

Guys, THANKS A MILLION for all the comments to my post, both here and in EBW e-mail group!

As it was not enough with nasty stones, I'm down with a cold. You know - head full of concrete, fever, big red nose... Yeah... No good to sit in the office, but could push myself to do some coralling, half-lying on the sofa.

What do you think of the necklace now? Kick me, but I like it much more now: there is better balance in composition and it lies better around the neck (more round- than "V"-shaped).


Thanks, u rock!
I think I'll call it "Charity".

To be or not to be?

Exactly as the heading suggests - here's the question: does this necklace have a right to exist, or should I re-do the strap part?

Short pre-history. Have you heard the Saga Of Swedish Election'2010? Sad story, actually. Nationalistic populists got into the parlament. Moreover, they've got quite a strong position. Their main thesis - Sweden needs no more foreigners.

My main thesis is, on the other hand - we are all Children of Earth. Screw nations, races, borders, sexual preferences. This necklace, basically, tells exactly that story.

Here you will find turquoise from China and USA, silver aloy from Tibet, Czech and Japanese seed beads, crystal from Austria, etc. That's the way I like it - all goodies are coming together and create something new.

However, there is one BUT... I am not sure if it should be left as it is? Should I make a large heavy bib-style necklace with lots of free-form elements & netting instead of the simple straps of strung beads? Or?
What do you think?

And look at those gorgeous turquoise Swarovski - trey are opaque, but what a sparkle! :)

Actually, I am quite pleased with bezels of those turquoises - I was playing around with freeform brickstitch.


Thanks for your imput!

Another tutorial!

Finally (!!!) I've managed to produce another tutorial. This time it is all about leatherwork.
I show my own way of making leaves of leather, and hopefully, the person who buyes the tutorial would end up with something like this:

For sale at my Etsy store at: http://www.etsy.com/listing/56947185/tutorial-leatherwork.

Meanwhile, I have ZERO inspiration for finishing dozens of UFOs lying around in my flat.
Remember "presumably kidney stones" from June? Those are quite confirmed gallstones by now. Completely unnecessary thing, I must say. I am in line for surgery.

On the bright side, I just got my Artbeads blogging order. Now I "just" need to get my ispiration back!

Wish me luck :)

Blackie

Me again! ;)
Finally, I've finished my Blackie!

It is a commission piece. I was gven a task to make something black with bronze, small and elegant, wearable after work to a bar to take a glass of whine with friends. Don't you just love these customers who give you completely free hands and just allow your creativity to flow?

Blackie is a composition of coralls and russian leaves wrapped around a large Czech crystal pendant. It asked for a sturdy rope, which I wanted to form a spiral to match swirls around the focal. Now, listen to me carefully: I HATE SPIRAL BRICKSTITCH ROPE and will never make another one again unless I absolutely have to. Because it takes AGES. And it is incredibly sensitive to the tension of your thread. Making the focal was a great fun, but making that particular sort of rope was a definitely wrong call. However, it looks great together (IMHO, where "H" stands for humble) ;).


This is it for today!

Autumn Swap

Well, I am busy as usually. Making several EPIC things (hopefully to enter some international competitions), preparing for my classes in Swedish PUSS bead show in October, etc.

Recently, I've finished another piece for a swap at biser.info. Turned out I love making presents ;)

This one is for a sweet lady from Russia, her name is Yulia. She wanted to have a free-form set in autumn colors, and here is what i have come up with.

This is the first time I used free-form to make a bezel. That was a cool experiment ;)


See you later!