When Preciosa asked me if I would like to make something with their beads I accepted immediately because they would send me beads in their newest finish, ivory, and if there is one color I love, it is ivory. Unsurprisingly, they asked their team of designers to focus on wedding, änd I happily dove into the box of beads to make as many things as I could (I was very busy with another thing and the deadline was quite short). I used a variety of stitches:
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| Diamond Weave - based on my design "Isatis" |
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| Saint-Petersburg stitch. This one really looks like a feather |
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| Based on my design "Isatis" |
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| MRAW - based on "Sera alla Scala" |
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| Bridal Sera alla scala on a bust This is a favorite design, with its heart shaped rope. |
I made this beadwoven haircomb with little petals and assorted hair pin.
The 2-hole cabochon beads which came in 3 sizes are fantastic. There are so many design possibilities. I have always wanted to create a fronthead piece for a bride, and with the super thin wire from beadalon and little haircombs, I made this dainty front jewellery using crimp beads to hold the beads in place. I found it really challenging to get the symmetry right.
Because they sent all sorts of shaped beads and pastel pearl lined seed beads, I decided to give bead mosaic a try. It was quite a learning curve, but I had lots of fun! The shaped beads really lend themselves well for mosaics. I made little pendants and earrings. You may think that using glue is easy or fast, but it is really not. I placed the beads one by one in most cases.
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| with beaded fan attached to the clutch |
I hope to do more bead mosaic in the future, but my favorite technique remains off-loom bead weaving and I made something I adore:
The new pastel pearl lined seed beads are absolutely delightful, but it is hard to capture their delightfulness in photos and their texture is marvelous. Really round seed beads feel magical in woven "fabric". The celestial light blue seed beads made me think of a perfect summer sky in Switzerland. It inspired me to create my own Eros & Psyche clasp using a Claspgarten clasp and transparent glass cabochon. I think that in this piece the beautiful pearlescence of the seed beads show well.
The stitch for the bracelet is hexagonal Diamond Weave (var. 3) with thread cover beads. The
motifs in the bracelet are clouds. I added pearls and larger seed beads
to better show the clouds. You will find a (free) graph for the clouds here.
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Seeing my work skillfully photographed by Preciosa's photographer is always a moment of true delight. Discovering in their album what my fellow bead designers made is a treat you may like to enjoy too. Nevertheless, the clasp that I made myself is more beautiful in real life and the bracelet is one of my forever favorites.
The clasp shows a miniature detail of the oil painting "Amour et Psyché" by William Adolphe Bouguereau
in 1890. The painting features Greek mythological figures Eros and Psyché, sharing an embrace and kiss. I love this painting.
Thank you for reading me. If you too like beadwoven bracelets like the one above, you can purchase the e-book Diamond Weave in my shop.
