International Beading Week 2021

By golly, what a week, my friends, what a wonderful week this has been! 

Thanks to the ever so dedicated folks of the Beadworkers Guild, we've had the most wonderful online celebration ever with beads. 

It was like a very good cuvée of champagne: great taste, festive bubbles and no headache afterwards.

 Every day a new stitch to talk about and lovely promps and quotes, meetings, a fabulous prize draw and many thing learned. It was fantastic. Even a new international common project has been launched, once more, by Sam Norgard, the "All Colors" project.

It was wonderful to Zoom-meet with people from around the globe. In particular those I've had contact with since so many years. I never dreamt that I'd see them one day in real life. Among these persons were Karen Beningfield from South Africa (beader and designer, member of and graphic illustrator for Contemporary Geometric Beadwork, who also helped me with the edition of the Diamond Weave book), Cate Venn, who is the most inspirational person & part of my "totem", and her husband Christopher Venn, who beads entire dresses in black tiny size 15° seed beads, and Nancy Jenner Kooyers, who is an incredibly talented beader who normally doesn't write patterns, but this year offered a pattern for the most adorable beaded faerie ever. If you haven't seen this tiny fairy yet, come and visit Facebook where they are popping up everywhere and are so cute!

The ambassadors and other designers gave us marvelous designs to play with. You can still download them from the Beadworkers Guild website. The patterns remain there after IBW is over. The collection of goodies is growing each year, and the contributions are amazing.

As every year, I offered a tutorial too. Two, in fact. One for the duration of the week only, to make a Gazebo Cascading tassle, and one for my Year Long Rainbow Project, which is a freeform peyote piece called Rivers of Color. 

The guide can be downloaded for free from my website. I call it a guide, because freeform creations cannot be completely copied. I think, however, that folks will have loads of fun trying this method.

Talking about the year long rainbow challenge: look at the pieces below!!! 

These are the creations of the participants who finished their project this year! I am each year amazed by how much talent there is out there, and by the variety of the pieces too.

Teresa "Keygirl" Shelton created a beautiful geometric bangle made with a clever method of her "cru": "Starts and ends with 3". She also offered her pattern to the BWG to be added to the IBW pattern page.

Diane De Gooyer made a set of bangles to have something to wear every day. Clever!

Diàna Balogh made a bangle with hundreds of little flowers, made with a gazillion little seed beads. We all want to know how she did this. Hopefull she will tell us in an upcoming Journal?

Jessica Hayman created an "eggbox" with intricate celtic knots in the most exquisite camaieu of colors of the rainbow. Mind blown!
And she donated the pattern for 1 knot to the list of IBW goodies!!

Margaret Haigh made her own necklace using the elements from the pattern "Square dance" designed by Heather Kingsley Heath - the pattern is available on the IBW pattern page of the Guild.

Caroline Lloyd created a stylish "French flowers" arrangement. It is incredible how only a few beaded leaves and flowers can become something so complete.

Nancy Deonarine beaded a collection of sparkling peyote pod ornaments - her colors match the IBW logo perfectly.

Teréz Kocsis made lovely little sparkly daisies.

Shelley Gillmann started with the yellow, orange and next colors of the IBW logo and then got so carried away that she didn't make jewelry, but 35 designs for "carrier beads", now offered as one of the IBW freebies for this year. The photo above shows 14 of them.

 Huge compliments to all!

And many thanks to all those who contributed patterns!
The next season is going to be beadybusy!

If you haven't tried yet, come and make a rainbow yourself this year! Each month a little something and at the end of the year you end up having something huge! Like this epic piece by Karan Parker from back in 2018 which I still adore.

Join the Facebook group to post your progress, find tips, or encouragement. 

Happy beading everyone!

Cath

IBW 2021 - "Hanging in there"

Beady peeps holding hands

 

International beading Week 2021 starts in one week!!!

Visit the Beadworkers Guild website, go to the page for IBW related events and then come on over to the group, invite/tell folks about your upcoming events if you plan to do something, may it be online or in real life. The incredible Cate Venn and her not less awesome husband Christopher, are hosting an informal Zoom beady get together the evening of the 29th and posted details about it in the group.

If you don't organize an event, show us your work made with one of the IBW patterns generously donated by the IBW Ambassadors. Show us photos of your mini-meetings with your beading buddy. Or videos if you like that better. Why? Because we need to share, more than ever, good moments. We need your joyful participation to help

HANGING IN THERE

which is our motto this year.

 

Thanks to the lovely members of the moderating/admin team who work hard behind the scenes, we will have a wonderful week of beading frenzy the IBW Facebook Group despite the pandemic.

Like every year, I am "hanging out there" to contribute too, and I will show you how to do my kind of freeform peyote. I don't think that I can call it freeform "à la Cath", but if like me you prefer to have some sort of methodology to help you "letting go" of strict structure, this might be your thing. And if this method is less about "letting go", it is a lot about "acceptance", because the beads will dictate their will.

 

My project may look like nothing yet, but wait for it! I am confident that you will love the final result. I'll show the WIP and will give guidance in the group, starting the 24th!

Hopefully, it will inspire you to get out more beads and do freeform peyote.

 

Gazebo cascading Tassel

Best of all, for us folks who cannot meet in person, the Guild has programmed MANY "drop-in" ZOOM meetings, bringing beadworkers together to share the love of the art of beading and stay in touch despite the sanitary restrictions. Beading keeps us sane! 

 

Find all the dates here.

 

As every year, the Guild will do a draw and to enter, all you need to do is making a tassel and sending a photo of it to the Beadworkers Guild. Post it in the IBW Facebook group too, even if that is not mandatory. There are wonderful prizes to win!

 

You don't have to be a member to join the fun. And it's free! All you need to do is place your reservation in your cart in the Guild's shop, check out as a guest, and there is nothing to pay.

 

Among the new patterns offered by the IBW ambassadors is included my Gazebo cascading tassel. It will be available only during IBW so make sure to not miss it.

 

Of course you can become a member of the Guild any time, and get the beautiful 4 quarterly Journals. 

I am sure that you will like the bunch of bead-obsessed folks you will meet and will adore the magazine. 

 

 
And you know what? This month's issue cover girl is... moi! With another tassel and a necklace! Here two photos showing the necklace  left and the tassel on its own right. I should have made a video of it. It sparkles so much!

 

Last but not least, you can use a special discount code in my shop at the occasion of this wonderful week of beading frenzy.

Use coupon code
IBW2021

to get 20% off on everything during IBW (from 24 July to 1 August 2021).

 

Happy Beading to all!

Cath

Kitsugi-inspired freeform peyote

I discovered freeform peyote and bead embroidery nearly at the same time. I was completely fascinated by Tina Koyama's and Lillian Todaro's beautiful beadwork.

I have never learned it from a teacher, or book and was a bit lost, but managed to make 2 necklaces.with bead embroidery and freeform straps. Both are dating back to 2006. One is called Atoll, inspired by the beautiful photography "Eye of the Maldives" by Yann Arthus-Bertrand, and the other is called BaBe ('Baah-Bay') - formed by 3 rivers, in Vietnam. Babe means 3 lakes, but it forms only one nowadays, due to all the sediments that have filled the bottom of these 3.

'Atoll'

'Babe'

Although I love the result very much, they are far from perfect, and I wanted to learn more beadweaving techniques before tackling this type of beadwork again. I got hooked on Cellini peyote, and geometric beading, but I knew that I would come back to freeform one day. 

I made progress and created many designs. One day, I dreamt of another, entirely freeform beadwoven necklace, called Liquid Earth. In that dream I offered it to sha-woman Keisha Crowther, aka Little Grandmother and founder of the Tribe of Many Colors. Keisha is a protector of Mother Earth and healer. I respect her work tremendously, and so I made it, and sent it to her.

'Liquid Earth'

Last Summer, I decided to offer a workshop to other persons who are also struggling with health issues, in collaboration with our common ergotherapist.

I decided to teach them peyote, and a freeform ring, and see what would happen. To prepare myself for this class, get my hands back at freeform peyote and have an example to show to them of what can be made with the technique I taught them, I made this 'River' bracelet and ring. 

'River'

'River' - upside down

River has a double glass button clasp.

'River' - ring

I was  pretty happy with the result. And my students were happy with theirs. And now I am in search of a place where to continue the adventure of beading all together. My ergotherapist herself is hooked too, and helping me. She will arrange for another place to visit in February, which is not soon enough, but alas, at least there is hope! And it is so close to my home that I should be able to go there by foot. Please, cross your fingers for me!
 

Now, after completing this piece, I decided to go for a special freeform peyote cuff, inspired by the art of Kitsugi, which is the art of repairing cracks in broken pottery by adding gold to focus the attention on the breach, and the story behind it. To make an item that was already something dear to our heart a piece of art, with more significance. 

I have been wanting to create a cuff like this since a long time. With beautiful materials.

My goal was to make an allegory of a walk of life, with its moments of darkness and light...

with stellar people met, and key moments, be they good or bad, and light passing through all the cracks.

I let my needle and beads take some initiatives and ...

it ended up becoming the Universe... Initially, moon and sun were not meant to be there (and finding the sun button was quite challenging), but the piece simply called for both to be there. 

Also, the moon, reversible, is black on the other side, which allows me to wear it with its bright or dark side to the front.

'Silver Lining' - precious metal seed beads, freshwater pearls, sterling silver
findings, a glass moon bead and a gold plated metallic sun button.

Apparently, when I do freeform, my love for nature makes me create landscapes of all sorts.

There are lots of tutorials and explanations out there to do freeform peyote. I hope that you will give it a try. It is very liberating!