Old and New Necklace

Now that I am back from traveling and teaching, I have completed my old and new element necklace design proposed by Art Beads. The antique brass flowers are imbedded on a brick stitched circle with loops designed to take the strung "new" resin bead elements. I wanted the flowers to stay right side out and not swing to the wrong side as they were being worn. The brick stitched palette with the spaced loops holds the flowers right side out. The resin elements are arranged in a rainbow progression, becoming larger toward the bottom to balance the asymmetrically placed flowers. The beads are strung on Conso, a braided nylon upholstery thread and knotted, gluing the knots. I find that I am just not adept with crimp beads and have never had a Conso necklace come apart. I had to delay stringing the strands of resin beads as I only had gold and silver closures which just didn't match the antiqueness of the flowers. Although I would have preferred a closure with two separate attachment sites, I felt that the brass color was more important and found the antique brass flower toggle gave just the right flavor. Joanne

 Back view of brick stitched supports

Disclosure: The Vintage brass filagree flower pendants were kindly provided free-of-charge by Artbeads.com, within the frames of Artbeads.com blogging program. The author of this blog has not received any payment from above-mentioned company. The post above represents only personal opinion of the blog author.

Fall Beadwork Necklace

I'm a little late with my Tribute to Fall necklace. I fell in love with this particular hand painted porcelain and sterling pendant from Artbeads, paired it with some stoneware tube beads repeating the triangles found in the pendant, and thought that I would imbed it in brick stitched chevrons and arrowheads. However, when I actually received the pendant, it was so strong that I just couldn't see surrounding it with seed bead work. I thought about this piece all winter. It just needed to stand alone. I am not a bead stringer but prefer to work with more elaborate stitching. I appreciate "less is more" when others do it, but tend toward a "more is better" person in my own work.

I finally hit on a strip of right angle weave and some glass chevron beads. I chose to work the RAW in large (for me) about size 6 beads so that I could use a heavier thread that I usually use since it would need to carry the weight of the pendant. The areas of right angle weave are alternated with short strung sequences containing the stoneware tube beads, glass chevrons and beads of glazed porcelain by Clay River Designs. The catch is a sterling toggle with imbedded carnelian by Star's Beads. I like to repeat elements found in the necklace in the catch, either by metal, color or both.

I was pleased that I could incorporate some beadwork stitching and still showcase this spectacular pendant. Joanne

  

Star's sterling-carnelian toggle clasp


Stoneware tubes 


Clay River Beads

Disclosure: The Hand painted porcelain and sterling pendant as well as the stoneware tube beads were kindly provided free-of-charge by Artbeads.com, within the frames of Artbeads.com blogging program. The author of this blog has not received any payment from above-mentioned company. The post above represents only personal opinion of the blog author.

Seahorse Necklace #3

My Seahorse necklace is complete featuring the lovely resin and sterling pendant by Tania Hartman and boro glass toggle closure provided to me by Artbeads (www.Artbeads.com). The result is an asymmetric design of brick stitched starfish and strung beads in cool aquas and teals with flexible loop in loop hinges. A summer combo. The Seahorse necklace will follow my bluebird necklace into the Potomac Fiberarts Gallery, Studio 18, at the Torpedo Factory Arts Center, 105 N Union Street in Alexandria, VA. Joanne

Disclosure: The Tania Hartman Resin and sterling pendant as well as the boro glass toggle were kindly provided free-of-charge by Artbeads.com, within the frames of Artbeads.com blogging program. The author of this blog has not received any payment from above-mentioned company. The post above represents only personal opinion of the blog author.

Seahorse Necklace #2

I am continuing to work on the seahorse necklace featuring a seahorse resin on sterling pendant by Tania Hartman provided to me by Art beads (www.Artbeads.com). I have pictured a beadwork starfish in progress. I first establish a ring of five beads and then construct a bead ladder out from each bead one at a time, brick stitching back to the center along one side of the ladder to move on to the next arm. The starfish arms are tapered by varying the size of the beads used.

I also like to incorporate "hinges" in my necklaces. This gives a pivot point that does not stress the thread. Here I have connected separate modules (the starfish) with loop in loop hinges. For more information on this method, look up the back issue of Beadwork magazine: Beadwork.  "Stress Redux:  Send in the Reinforcements!"  by Joanne Strehle Bast, Summer 1998 issue. 

I am also using as a closure the boro glass toggles, also provided by Artbeads. I really like the use of a catch that does not add a distracting metal element into the beadwork. Joanne


Disclosure: The Tania Hartman Resin and sterling pendant and boro glass toggle were kindly provided free-of-charge by Artbeads.com, within the frames of Artbeads.com blogging program. The author of this blog has not received any payment from above-mentioned company. The post above represents only personal opinion of the blog author.