Beading Arts

    Kerri Fuhr Kerri Fuhr   My name is Kerri Fuhr and I am a full time lampwork glass bead artist living in British Columbia, Canada. Using a tabletop torch, rods of glass and a few hand tools, I sculpt detailed focal beads and ornate bead sets for jewelry designers and collectors world wide. I am inspired by nature and many lively creatures are depicted on my beads!      Dragonflies, honey bees, ravens and herons are among my favorite subjects and with each bead I create I strive to capture their character and spirit. Rich colors and delicate tapestry - inspired scrollwork also decorate many of my beads - the more detail and color the better! New designs are featured often so be sure to check out my blog for daily updates and fun new beads!     Technorati Tags: handmade beaded jewelry , wearable art , beads , jewelry , necklace , mixed media , beading

  Fine Silver Link, Pearl, and Crystal Earrings Artist: Tammy Powley Location: South Florida Website & Blog: About.com Jewelry Making Crafty Princess Diaries [Editor's note - As the Jewelry Making guide at About.com, Tammy provides many projects for her readers. She has graciously chosen images to share with you for which there are instructions!! The link is below each picture. Thanks so much, Tammy!] Tammy, how do you describe your work? My jewelry designs are usually petite and practical. I like to make jewelry that I find comfortable to wear, and I’m too klutzy to wear anything overly large. While I don’t totally “diss,” trends, I lean more towards classic looks with a little added zing. I like to use all kinds of materials, but very often you’ll find beads mixed in some how, even if the piece is primarily made of metal. Silver and Crystal Autism Adjustable Puzzle Necklace What is your creative process like? I normally work best when I have chunks of time...

I believe that Hadar has self-published this book, and you can buy it directly from her at this time. Her work with metal clays of all types is amazing, so I believe that she is a great person to learn from if you’d like to take up this medium. Information and ordering links are available on Hadar’s website . Technorati Tags: handmade beaded jewelry , wearable art , beads , jewelry , necklace , mixed media , beading

Here are the super-easy steps to creating this pendant: 1. Stamp black polymer clay with a texture plate. Cut slits at both the top and bottom for jump rings and gently mold the clay closed around them. Bake according to the directions for your brand of clay. 2. Mix liquid sculpey with gold mica powder. Wipe it all over your clay and let it settle in stamped parts. Rebake. 3. Sand the surface with fine sandpaper to remove mica from the raised surface of the texture. Now the piece will look like a mosaic with black grout! Add another thin layer of plain liquid sculpey to the surface if desired and bake one more time. 4. Create dangles to attach to the bottom jump ring. I kept the middle bead “floating” by using a small crimp on the headpin. Use Diamond Glaze or E6000 to glue brass stampings or other charms to the pendant surface. Add a large jump ring or bail to the top. Copyright 2008 Cyndi Lavin. Not to be reprinted, resold, or redistributed for profit. May be printed out for personal...

Dichroic three hinge silver encased pendant with sterling silver curved tubes, Czech glass beads and sterling silver lobster claw clasp Artist: Karen Leslie Website: The Jewelry Collection by Karen Leslie Chunky Amethyst nugget beads with fancy Bali saucer beads and spacers with a fancy toggle clasp Karen, how do you describe your work? My designs consist of one of a kind and limited edition pieces. I pride myself on the ability to find individual, distinctive and truly unique components to incorporate into my designs to make a special creation. My designs are contemporary and timeless and can go with any outfit. Lapis rectangle center stone with Lapis round beads and Bali spacers, sterling silver lobster claw clasp What is your creative process like? As far as my creative process, I choose my pieces because I like the different shapes of the stones, color, and texture. I don’t always have a specific design in mind when purchasing my components. It could be months later...

1. Pick the items that you will use for your pin and decide on a layout. Do any preparation work necessary (eg, I had to saw the back off of the Mahjong tile because it was too thick to embed well). 2. Condition and roll out a lump of black polymer clay on parchment paper to approximately 1/4 inch thick. Use a rolling pin or a clay-dedicated pasta machine. 3. Lay the pieces onto the sheet of clay and sink them down into it. Remove the pieces before baking. 4. Cut the polymer clay edges with the exacto knife, leaving a narrow border around the objects you’ll embed. Smooth the edges with your fingers. Cut a slit in the top and bottom edges with the exacto knife and insert a jump ring half way into each slit. Smooth the clay closed around them. Texture the top surface with a rubber stamp if desired. 5. Bake as directed on top of a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper. Exact times and temperatures vary depending upon the brand of clay used. 6. After the pendant has cooled, use a small p...

A Charming Exchange by Kelly Snelling & Ruth Rae Having taken part in several really wonderful collaborative projects, I was immediately drawn to this book. All of the wonderful wearables shown in it are the results of round-robins, collaborations, and swaps. It’s amazing how much time and energy it takes to organize just one of these projects, and here is a book that is full to bursting with…well, they claim there are 25, but I swear there are more! I found several pieces that inspired me to get going immediately and to make something. That doesn’t happen to me with every book I read. Often, I’ll run across a technique that I want to try, or a style that appeals to me, but rarely do I end up toting out my bins and diving right in. Here’s one thing I made, a bracelet: The projects aren’t overly detailed with exact counts and sizes. For some that may be frustrating, but it’s just the nature of working with found objects and mixed media. Know that going in: you’ll find lots to inspir...

Paris Photo Necklace Artist: Beth Cummings Business Name: Diffraction Location: Chicago, IL Website: Diffraction Ivy Stud Earrings Beth, how do you describe your work? I’ve always been a photographer, and one day I had this epiphany that I needed to combine my photography with jewelry in order to create some really bold, modern and graphic pieces. Basically the kind of stuff I like to wear. All the images that appear in my jewelry are my original photographs that I transfer to thick plastic and hand cut, shape and wire. When first creating the line I wanted a name that would reflect the uniqueness of the original photography while still sounding modern and intriguing. Thus, Diffraction was born! Sliced Earrings What is your creative process like? Well this is really a two part question for me. The photography aspect of it happens in chunks, my husband and I will go on roadtrips, trips abroad or sometimes just to our local farmers market and I’ll capture things that ...

Bead Journey by BeadStyle Magazine The top 26 projects from BeadStyle Around the World special issue, plus eight all-new projects representing five countries and three additional new pieces, provide even more inspiration. Where do you want to go today? Asia and the Pacific Rim, Africa, Europe, the Americas? Take an exciting trip around the globe with Bead Journey! If you didn’t get to see BeadStyle ’s special Around the World issue, you’ll love the projects packed into this booklet. With the large, easy to follow step-out photos that BeadStyle is famous for, there are projects that will take you all over the globe with their materials, color combinations, and style. I found a project near the back that inspired me to use some of the lovely lampwork glass beads that I bought when we were in Italy. Funny enough, it wasn’t one of the Italian designs, but nonetheless it seemed to speak to me to get out those beads…now! It’s not exactly what the project shows to make, but isn’t that part...

Artist: Phaedra A. Torres Business name: Lluvia Designs Location: at a bead show, preferably, but in West Covina, CA when not. Website: Lluvia Designs Phaedra, how do you describe your work? I usually like to say that I specialize in “unwearable” jewelry. Mostly because it’s the easiest way to describe it, and partially because I just like to see people’s reactions to that. When I tell people I make jewelry, I usually add the disclaimer of “but not normal jewelry” because I can see the pictures forming in their heads of the jewelry they think I make. If I don’t steer them away from that image, they usually don’t know what to say when they actually see some of the junky crazy stuff I make. I spare us both the pain. Lluvia Designs was born because I always liked the name and decided that if I had children, one would be named Lluvia, which means “rain” in Spanish. Well, I decided not to have real and human kids, so the name was adopted by my jewelry. What is your cre...

Felt, Fabric, and Fiber Jewelry by Sherri Haab I was trying to figure out how to explain the way I feel about Sherri Haab , and this write-up on Amazon caught my eye: Sherri Haab knows jewelry. Sherri Haab knows fiber and fabric. Sherri Haab knows crafting. Is there anything Sherri Haab can’t do? Frankly, no. She’s the Superwoman of crafting books! That’s it in a nutshell! I have drooled over Sherri’s resin jewelry and her work in metal clay, and now she throws me this curveball by working in soft maleable materials that I just didn’t expect. Some of the pieces in this book are elegant, some are funky and whimsical, but all of them are pure Sherri-creativity! Sherri covers basic techniques in knotting, embroidery, simple stitching, crochet, and even quilting, all in the quest to come up with original fabric jewelry pieces. This is a beginner book, so if you’ve already got a lot of fabric skills, it may not be challenging enough for you. But if you’re looking forward to adding fabrics a...

Bead Romantique: Elegant Beadweaving Designs by Lisa Kan From the name of this book, you shouldn’t be at all surprised to learn that the designs featured within will appeal to your girly (but not silly), romantic, and feminine side. The pieces that Lisa Kan has designed and shared are lush and elegant, never over-the-top, which was what I feared when I first heard about it! Wrong!! These are gorgeous pieces, but never overstated. From the book’s description: Inspired by art history, this step-by-step guidebook features 17 designs influenced by the Gothic, Renaissance, Victorian, Art Nouveau, and Art Deco eras reinterpreted in the artist’s distinctive, contemporary style. This is not a book for beginners, although if you are ambitious enough, by all means give it a shot. The inspiration alone from this book could be the push you need to get you into more challenging work! Don’t forget to check out The BookShop from time to time for more great bead and jewelry books. Technorati Tags: h...

One of the things I love most about making these pins is that you can cut out a bunch of base pieces all at one time, and then you can spend a little time here and a little there putting the pins together using whatever little scraps come to hand. Or are lying around on top of your work table! There are lots of materials that you can use for a base, but one of the easiest to work with is good old Foam-Core. It’s easy to cut, you can stick wires into it to embed things if needed, and it can be toughened up when you’re done by a coating of two-part resin. Like I said, I usually cut out a bunch of pieces in one session, and then work on them little by little. This particular pin is called The Key to My Heart , and it features an antique skeleton key, some origami paper, a couple strands of fiber, and a couple of beads. Here’s how I made it…change the directions to suit your own projects!  If you want a skeleton key and don't have a real one, there's a cute one you can get from...

The Naughty Secretary Club by Jennifer Perkins Ohmygosh, never before have I wanted so much to leave my boring world of glass and gemstones and get into plastic and resin!! Jennifer Perkins has written a totally delightful book, full of naughty kitschy fun (naughty because she was making jewelry back when she was supposed to be collating and filing. Well, who can blame her? These projects are WAY more fun! If you don’t have a sense of humor, leave this book right on the shelf. Jen invites us all to not take ourselves seriously, and I found it to be a breath of fresh air :-) Her projects are marked as to difficulty, and in an attempt to get my feet wet in kitsch, so to speak, I made this fun fun fun bracelet, which I have unimaginatively named Cloth and Sparkle . I’m boring, so sue me! Technorati Tags: handmade beaded jewelry , wearable art , beads , jewelry , necklace , mixed media , beading