Bloom 9 at the Coast Collective

The Coast Collective is welcoming in spring with its 9th annual Bloom show!  The opening is Saturday April 1 from 1:00-3:00pm, and the show runs Wednesday to Sunday until April 16th.

The beautiful photography art on the poster is by the amazing Penny Pitcher, who has three other pieces in the show as well, so if you like what you see, you should definitely come check it out!

I have a Forget-me-not Fringe necklace in the show for a bit of springtime vintage charm:

Hope to see you there!

Autumnal Colours Show

Hello everyone, I have very exciting news this post.  I've had a piece accepted into the Autumnal Colours show at the Coast Collective.

Autumn is my favourite season, so I'm very excited about this.  I will be at the reception mentioned on the poster there, on Saturday August 29th, and I'm thinking of baking some pumpkin snickerdoodles for the occasion, so you should definitely come check it out.

The piece that's been accepted is my Autumn Colours coral-style necklace.  It's inspired by trees changing colours in the fall.  I posted about this piece back in 2013, but couldn't really justify spending the time to finish it since these large pieces take so much time to complete, and it's hard to charge minimum wage for my time on them.  That's part of why it was so exciting to be accepted into this show based on the work in progress picture -- it gave me a good reason to prioritize finishing a piece I really liked but had put on the back burner.

So without further ado, here it is:

It's made with five different colours of seed beads, golden bugle beads, and 100 Swarovski crystal bicones (fire opal), including the one on the extender chain I added to make the necklace adjustable.  It's choker-length without the chain, since the coral part extends a good few inches below the length of the chain, but it can be worn more loosely if desired.  I've priced it at $299 for the show.

Here's another shot of it hanging on a bust with the extender chain draped over the top:

I am absolutely delighted with how it turned out, and I hope you like it just as much as I do.  Hopefully I will get to meet some of you at the reception.  Please let me know you read about this on my blog if you do come.

New Pieces Ready for Acres of Art

As promised, I am posting some pictures of new pieces I will have ready for the Coast Collective's  Acres of Art show on July 12th (details in a previous entry).  Many of them are familiar designs in new colours, but there are a couple new designs or new variations on old ones.

Let's start with new colours in familiar designs.  I've done a bunch of new colours in my pearl bracelets.  As you'll see, I've expanded into some brighter colours for the summer months.  These are made with glass pearls and seed beads and have lobster claw clasps so I can add an extender chain and make them adjustable if need be.  They are $20.

The first is a combination that makes me think of August in the Okanagan, of multitudes of grasshoppers singing in the sun baked hills.  It's caramel pearls with gold-core green seed beads.

The next bracelet features the same gold-core green seed beads but has green pearls.  I suppose it's the June or July to the previous bracelet's August.  Or more of an herb garden.

The final piece using these seed beads has violet pearls and is definitely more of a flower garden or summer meadow.  I really love this combination.  I'll almost definitely do a necklace in it at some point.

  

 

And here's the three of them together because I'm considering doing a multi-strand necklace in these colours.  They also happen to be Mardi Gras colours, which is fun.

Sticking to the violet and green theme, I also have a set with green pearls and some lovely oily-finish violet seed beads.  Kind of a reversal of a green "vine" with violet blooms.

I also did one with those same oily-finish violet seed beads with lilac/lavender pearls.  This one is cooler in tone.

And to finish off the range of purples, I have one with the violet pearls and iris seed beads.  The violet pearls really bring out the pink iridescence in the finish on the iris beads.

The next few bracelets all feature navy blue pearls.  The first one is relaxing, deep and cool with silver seed beads.

The next features a bit more contrast -- in fact, its opposite on the colour wheel -- in the form of clear copper-core seed beads.  I feel like the copper makes the blue pop more vibrantly.  And I don't know why, but I feel like copper is the metal of summer.

The final navy blue piece features blue copper-core seed beads which give a more muted version of the previous design while adding extra depth through the second shade of blue.

I'll fess up I did also do a few more neutral pearl bracelets.  I noticed when posting my previous batch of photos that I was out of white with silver, so I made one to go with the necklace I have.

I also decided to try a white with iris.  I was delighted by the result.  It's very delicate and feminine and airy.

I also brought some colour to white pearls with the icy blue seed beads I've come to love.  You've probably already seen them with dark grey or black pearls, but I can't believe I didn't mix them with white before, because it's gorgeous.

Which brings us to necklaces, because I loved this combination so much that I made a necklace in it.  Here it is on my snazzy new bust.  Like my other single-strand pearl necklaces, it's $39.

I also have a couple new multi-strand designs to show you. 

The first is in sun-kissed gold tones.  It's an asymmetrical two-strand design of white pearls with bright gold seed beads and caramel pearls with clear brown seed beads.  I have a few shots so you can get a good sense of it, and a close-up of the filigree box clasp.

The next is a triple-strand center with a single strand chain.  It's a design I came up with to make a triple strand necklace more manageable in terms of time and materials.  The single strand chain is a new design featuring white pearls and grey-silver core seed beads.  This is attached to a lovely silver-coloured three-to-one connector which is in turn connected to light grey, dark grey, and black lines of pearls with iris seed beads.  It's quite long and I need to get a larger bust to display it properly.

That's it for pearls.  I actually have a couple more bracelets to show you.  They are two versions of lace stitches with seed beads.

The first is done with grey silver-core seed beads and is horizontal lace.  Because of the number of beads in each loop, it ends up curling or ruffling, which I'll fess up was by accident but I thought it was pretty fun so I kept it.

The next one is more of a cuff.  It's vertical lace made with pink pearl-finish seed beads and edged with black pearl-finish or hematite-finish seed beads.  It looks really fun emerging from a long sleeve, but I think it could be pretty funky summer-wear too.

Back to necklaces.  I have another familiar design with new colours.  It's a daisy chain with bugle bead leaves in blue.  So it's a forget-me-not chain.  here it is on my new bust and then a bit more of a closeup on my old flat stand.  Like its violet sister, it's $30.

 

And the final piece I want to show you isn't new at all, but I am forever trying to get a good photo of it.  Here's my latest effort, on my new bust: Treasures of the Deep.

And that brings this really long entry to a close.  I am busily at work on new beach glass pieces for the show as well, since everything I've posted photos of before is over at the Maritime Museum.  I may or may not have time to post photos before the show on the 12th, but even if I don't get pictures up, they will be there.

New Photos of Earrings

As mentioned in my previous post, I will be at Coast Collective's Acres of Art show on Saturday, so this week I'll be posting pictures of some of the pieces I will be selling there. 

I'm going to start off with some earrings that you've seen before if you're a longtime reader.  I'm much happier with these photos though.  As always, you can click on the images to enlarge them.

First up are some of my tassel earrings.  These are made with silver-plate ear wires, bright silver-plate tulip-shaped caps, iris seed beads, silver bugle beads, and blue E-beads.  They're $20.

I have another pair of tassel earrings in cool tones.  These are made with silver-plate ear wires, dark silver coloured tulip-shaped caps, turquoise seed beads, silver bugle beads, and blue E-beads.  They're $20.

The final pair of tassel earrings I have are in gold tones.  These have gold toned ear wires, gold toned tulip-shaped caps, green seed beads, brown silver-core seed beads, and gold bugle beads.  They're $20.

Next up are a set of fun freeform coil earrings.  The first pair are done with copper wire and pale green beads with a lovely inner banded shine.  They're $20.

I have another pair made with copper wire and the same green beads, but these ones feature a scroll or spiral on the bottom.  These are $25.

I have a freeform coil pair designed to go with my harlequin necklace and bracelet designs.  They're made with silver-plated copper wire and glass pearls in white, grey, and black.  They are $20.

I also have some freeform coil earrings that use miracle beads.  Miracle beads are those really snazzy ones that have a sort of layered look as though there's an inner bead beneath a shimmery transparent outer layer (and unfortunately, photos never seem to do them justice).  This first pair is fantastic for summer, featuring silver-plated copper wire and a refreshing cool blue set of miracle beads.  These earrings are $25.

The next pair features gold-plated wire and cherry-red miracle beads.  They're $25.

These final earrings are a pair of donut wraps done on shell hoops.  They feature silver-plated copper wire, blue and purple E-beads, and some interesting pink rectangular beads.  They're $35.

And here's another picture of them because I thought that they made my glass look like an owl and that amused me.  (See, they're like the owl's big eyes?)

And I think that's enough for today.  Tomorrow I'll post pictures of some of the new necklaces and bracelets I've been working on.

Final Photo Update: Miscellaneous Pieces

Hello all,

Here are the last of the pieces I photographed on my big photo spree.

I'll start with the daisy chains.  Up first is a necklace of violet blooms with leaves in between, giving it a sort of 1920s retro fringe feel (seed beads, bugle beads, lobster claw clasp):

 These necklaces (I do have them in more colours now and am happy to make them in any colour requested) are $29.

I also have some daisy chain bracelets of various designs, any of which can be made into necklaces if someone wants (seed beads, bugle beads, e beads):

The violet one with the leaves is $15 and the pink and forget-me-not blue ones are $12.

I have a few more simple and inexpensive bracelets made from seed beads.  First up are some looped varieties, for $10:

I also have some looped with an extra strand which because of their colours I call my goldenchain bracelets.  I think I stole the term from Dylan Thomas.  They're $15.

At the other end of the pricing spectrum I have a new shot of my Treasures of the Deep necklace.  I want $299 for this, so that's what it is if I sell it directly.  If it goes into a gallery though, the price will go up based on the commission they take.  I'll let you know if that happens.  (seed beads and mother of pearl focal bead, filigree hook clasp)

And finally I have my celestial charm bracelet, which can be worn one of two ways.  This bracelet is $15.  This first photo shows it in a spread out bangle style (seed beads, various metal charms):

It can also be worn twisted up in a tight rope:

And that concludes the updated set of photos.  Next post you'll be seeing some of the new pieces I've worked on since then and/or some fresh photos of my earrings.

Beaded Bangles

Here's the next set of photos from my attempt to photograph my inventory a couple months back.  This entry will feature my beaded bangle bracelets.  These sold quite well last season so I'm down to only a few colours. Let me know if there are other combos you'd like to see.

These bracelets are $10 each or $25 for a set of three because they're fun to mix and match and wear in a set like bangles, which is why I call them that.

Here's a photo of my current remaining inventory:

All these bracelets are made from bugle beads, e beads, and seed beads in various colours.  As mentioned, they can be worn alone, or combined.  Here are a few combos I came up with on the day of the photo shoot.

First up, here's a tropical summery blend of golds, blues, greens, turquoise, and a splash of purple:

Next is a more feminine combo of pinks, whites, and purples, with a gentle blend of gold and silver:

Or you can go for bolder reds and blacks and golds:

Or if you're not so keen on matching, you could go for a mix of neutral cool tones with a splash of colour: