Venetian Delights!

....and a shake up for Graceful Deviant!

Having had a mammoth lack of motivation following my Canadian road trip (holiday blues doesn't quite cover it!) I was surprised by my boyfriend with a trip to Venice for our anniversary!
It was exactly what I needed to grab some inspiration and yet again, some awesome handmade goodies! On the morning we were due to fly home we took a boat over to the island of Murano, renowned for its glass making. I was in heaven and could quite easily spend a few days let alone a few hours especially as you could walk into factories and watch the makers creating their beautiful masterpieces. Here's some of my haul!

Silver lined glass drops, hollow formed beads and traditional millifiore rounds

Say 'hello' to my little friend!

Plus I had to get a little addition for my Christmas travel tree!
This stunning glass sculpture also makes a great pit stop for the birds!

So one of the reasons I think I was finding motivation difficult was because I was finding my work heading in too many directions and this was the case for both Graceful Deviant and The Blue Starfish. For Graceful Deviant it became simple - create work in collections. I have previously asked my Facebook following how they prefer to shop and the overriding feeling was by type, i.e necklace, earrings etc. So nothing changed on the website in terms of how you could search. But I have increasingly felt that for some it may look too diverse and so rather than change to shopping by collection only, the choice will be available! Having had a think on collection titles this is what will be available so far:

Plus there will be an additional 'Simply Silver' and 'Simply Gemstones' coming soon too as I seem to have underestimated the demand for things like simple hammered silver rings or just one gemstone as a pendant!
For The Blue Starfish jewellery I couldn't quite put my finger on exactly what my direction was after having recently tried my hand at a lot of new techniques which didn't seem to 'fit' my look.
It was only after seeing a lot of talk about autumn and the seasons combined with a comment a customer made to me at a handmade fair that I realised where I stood! The comment (and thinking back I get a few along these lines) was that the colours I use are so bright and complimentary. That's when I understood what my niche was - great colour combos that didn't necessarily follow the seasonal or high street trends! So that is what I will strive to continue!
The next blog post will feature a lot of new work for The Blue Starfish so I hope to see you then :)

Another string to the bow!

Bezel making technique finally achieved.... 

This has been, quite literally, the most exciting week in the studio for me! Although slightly worrying in some respects too because now I know this technique is achievable, I'm going to want to go on a spending spree for gemstone cabochons and fancy bezel wire!

It all began about 3 years ago when I commissioned a glass artist friend of mine (Jo Turner) to make a glass cabochon for me. I spent many hours researching how to go about making a setting and bought in all the necessary equipment. Low and behold, I was able to create this beast of a ring!

The basic ingredients - a cabochon, bezel wire & sheet silver

One huge ring!

I added the beaded wire to hide a few soldering mistakes!

So off I went on my merry way sourcing some more lovely glass cabochons!

These glass cabochons look like the contain mini galaxies or nebulae!

But could I solder those bezels?! Perhaps they were just too big and I couldn't get my silver sheet hot enough? Well, 3 years on and I have finally got this technique to work again for me - fluked the first try I guess, I'm not sure!
It's pretty hard for me to pick myself up after failure. Some people are able to bounce back no problems but for me, I stew for long periods of time. I consider the financial costs of having to purchase more materials, new equipment and question my own sanity - after all, isn't the quote about insanity something to do with repeating the same task and expecting a different outcome?!
So every few months I would come back to this technique, try something new but alas, fail. Until finally, last week, I had a breakthrough! What did it in the end? Buying a tripod with wire gauze allowing me to heat my silver sheet from below - it worked a treat! Here are some work in progress shots:

The bezel wall freshly soldered onto the sheet silver - no gaps!

Carefully sawing around the bezel wall

Soldered on a beaded loop to the back - ta da!

To prove this wasn't a fluke either I also successfully managed another 2 settings but these are a top secret personal project - all will be revealed shortly!

Thanks for reading!

Featured Bead Artisan Part VI: Linda Newnham

A very warm welcome to Linda who makes the most glorious glass beads over on the Isle of Wight! You will recognise a lot of her work in my designs as I am a big fan of her style!

How did you begin your craft?

It all started when I went to some ceramics classes with a friend and made some beads. Of course I had to make something with them and the next logical step was to take a jewellery making class where I made a necklace, bracelet and earrings using the beads I had made.

Linda's Ceramic Bead Bracelet

I found the process of making the beads very slow, making them one week, glazing them the next and then having to go back the following week to pick them up.

There were only 2 bead shops on the Isle of Wight where I live (only 1 now) with not a great selection so I started buying jewellery from charity shops that I could break up and use. I found buying beads online a frustrating experience so when I saw someone making glass beads during an Open Studios visit I was fascinated. I was so excited at the thought I could make my own beads in any colours I liked.

I set about investigating online to see what I would need to set up this craft of lampworking and found Becky Fairclough who lived not far from my Mum and did induction courses. I signed up for a 2 day course and made my first glass beads. That was in June of 2011. I picked up my equipment from the Big Bead Show in September and finally started making beads in the November and I haven't looked back since.

An early picture of Linda's studio - it's grown a lot in recent years!

Where do you draw your inspiration? 

That's a tricky one as it's never from just one source, sometimes it's someone else's work such as  glass artist such as Chihuly or a painter. But quite often I find it is in the process of making beads that inspiration strikes, one thing leads to another and ideas pop into my head as I go along.

Describe one of your favourite techniques to use in your work?

I would have to say at the moment it is making headpins for those of you who don't know what a headpin is, it is basically a glass bead on the end of a piece of wire. 

Fabulous Glass Bead Headpins

Is there anything new you are itching to try and incorporate?

I have so much glass I haven't tried yet and a gold fuming kit I have yet to use to name but a couple of things I would like to try.

What would you describe as your biggest professional achievement?

Well, I am going to narrow that down to my biggest achievement in lampworking and that would be my recent win of the jewellery category of the Glass Beadmakers UK annual competition at Flame Off. A necklace inspired by a Dale Chihuly sculpture I saw in Murano last year. I am very proud of this piece which has over 100 headpins in it.

 You can find out more about Linda's work via her website and stay in touch on Facebook!