Friday beads!

It is a beautiful day in the Mother City today, and we have been promised an even better (warmer) weekend. This morning the birds outside my bedroom were really chirpy. Everywhere new leaves is growing out of trees and bushes, and there is quite a few flowers opening up. I love being able to wear summer clothes again!

Here is a new bead set that I have made. Lovely chunky disks that could be used in your jewellery! I have used 6 different coloured glass, both in the opaque and transparent spectrum. By using only white, black and transparent greys I were able to create a monochromatic set that would look lovely with just about anything! It is available in my Etsy store ...

And some new earrings for my brick & mortar shop! Tiny little beads, with sterling and fine silver wires.

More Shard Beads on Etsy and a necklace

A red hollow bead necklace. I have (as with the clear one shown a few days ago) left the surface uneven, showing the layers of glass, when I built the hollows. I used transparent orange, but it looks more like a light red in natural light. It is for sale in my brick & mortar shop, but should you be interested in it, please convo me! I ship world wide ...

I have blown more shards, and this is what I came up with. I decided to blow some white glass. You guys know how soupy white glass gets when super heated? Try making a hollow on the end of the blow mandrel, hehehehe! But the results really pleased me. The beads were etched, and the white looks almost like spilled milk on the spheres. I think I need to make some for myself too ...

And a set of pressed white beads with some red, orange and yellow shards, and some micro stringer details.

Everything is available at my Etsy shop!

New work on Etsy!

I have been on a shard blowing blitz the last week, and this is what I have come up with! For a few years I have been wanting to make these beads, but always got sidetracked with other stuff. I do not know if it because spring seem to be in the air here in Cape Town (albeit chilly and wet at times), but I suddenly have an urge to really go bright!

I think that these 2 sets will really look lovely made up in combination with some silver and other beads! The beads were all hand formed by me, using gravity as my main tool. The shards were placed on the base bead, and melted in. I allowed the stringer to stay slightly raised, and it gives a lovely tactile feel to the beads. On request I could try my best to make smaller ones, that would be a perfect ear ring size!

I have used ultra thin stringer to decorate the surface of the beads, and allowed it to be slightly irregular. It reminds me of kinder art.

And speaking of kinder, the two most beautiful and cool kids have visited me in the shop today! My sister and her family came to Cape Town for a long weekend, and I had the opportunity to reconnect with the girls. Initially shy, they immediately warmed up when I gave them some beads, lol.

A new look for the shop!

Sadly our one partner choose to leave the shop yesterday, and removed all her stock and shop furniture. This caused quite a bit of late night work, and last night I completed new display units for the shop window. This morning poor Goldie walked into a shop still covered in wood dust, stock standing around and just general mayhem.

But within a few hours we were able to have the shop cleaned up and re-arranged displays to our satisfaction.

New stock received from friends found display space and suddenly our little shop looked brand new. I must admit that I am very happy and satisfied with the new look we created. Now I just need to get cracking with my studio area. It looks as if a bomb has exploded in it!

Trade show

Here is some belated images of the trade show where I showcased some of my work. The Cape Craft and Design Institute had hosted it and invited buyers, exporters and interior designers in the city to attend it. We each got a 2 x 1 meter booth, that we had to decorate ourselves. This created a bit of a problem for me, as I wanted to create little islands of interest, vs a table of mixed work. I wanted to showcase each work as an individual focus. But budget restraints had to ensure that I created something long lasting and effective.

I had some bedside tables that I bought from crafters that sell them on the street corners of our cities. These wooden and wicker furniture is made from scrap pieces of wood and it gives unemployed people the opportunity to earn a living working for themselves. By buying it from them, I feel that I contribute to preventing poverty in my country and hopefully help reduce crime at the same time.

After a few measurements, I took the beloveds utility and went shopping for super wood. At a nominal cost, they cut the pieces to size for me, and back home. A neighbor was supposed to help me, but never pitched. So a mad dash of me finishing off last minute work and pots of wood glue, filler and sanding blocks got all finished. I made tiny little floating shelves that were fitted onto a back board. Since these slide onto the wooden blocks that is screwed onto the board, I could remove them for easy storage once the trade show is over. I painted everything white.

Setting up was a breeze. A final touch-up with the paint roller, and I could arrange all my pieces on the stand. A set of spotlight created focus on the individual shelves, highlighting the work. I could store all my bags and what not in the shelves, thus keeping everything nice and tidy.

Yesterday we had a meeting at the CCDI where some prizes were handed over to the exhibitors. There were 5 prizes in total, and to my utmost surprise I took home 2! The exhibitors had to choose the best stand, and my peers awarded me with this prize. I also got a silver (2nd) award for the best stand as chosen by the organisers and visitors.

I was very satisfied with the outcome of the trade show, as I have made some valuable contact with buyers and exporters.

Here is some new work that I delivered to one of the galleries that visited the trade show:

Tea, anyone?

Helter skelter minds and a full week

These last few weeks have not been easy on me ... I do not want to bore you with the gory details, so let's just stick to me and my tears equaled the amount of rain we had in the same time frame here in the Western Cape, lol.

In between this there was lots of hours spent working as a RN at the various hospitals and clinics, and the new Candle Stick range that I started to play with.

These and some of my other glass and ceramics were submitted to a panel last week for consideration to partake in a Trade Exhibition, hosted by the Cape Craft and Design Institute. Gosh, I really love these people!

On Monday I got the E-mail telling me that my work has been selected for the show. I got word last week through the grapevine that over a 100 crafters applied for it, and they were only choosing 20 for the show. So, the selection was really tough and I know that there is a lot of art and craft happening in our city that is WAY better than me ...

The retail industry, media and other key role players is invited to the 3-day event. All is organised very professionally, with professional set builders that will assist us with the building of our stalls. Furthermore, I am expected to attend a workshop in Displaying and Styling next week with a local design guru, Leonard Shapiro (www.craftsouthafrica.co.za). Due to other obligations, I have been unable to attend a set of workshops lead by him during the previous weekends, so this is my opportunity to get some of his genius to rub off on me!

The down and out of this trade show is that I have the opportunity to make direct sales, but also have the chance to get orders from retailers! And if my stand is nice enough and sales worth mentioning, I could be lucky enough to win a spot at a huge trade Expo in 2010 in Johannesburg!

But this week is spent studying. It is the second month of our Entrepreneurial Marketing course, and the homework keeps me busy till the wee hours of the morning every day. The focus this week is on business practices and stuff like how to draft a good business plan. Horrible details about invoicing, quotes, pricing of your work got thrown on us today, ugh! Stuff that will give any decent artist nightmares for life!

I still have lots of homework to do tonight, so bye for now!

Bumpy jewels

I have been working way too many hours as a RN these past few weeks, but it was all done for a good reason, ;-)

Luckily I was able to squeeze some torch time in and gave up on a lot of sleep. The problem is that I have just too much ideas racing through my mind coupled with some other day to day issues. But when that torch is lit, a peace overcomes me and I can go into a sort of a hypnosis that is just glass and heat.

These are some images of my 'trance' beads. Please note, these are 'honkers'. I am talking easily 30 mm wide (hole to hole) and more width wise ... But what a ball these were to make! One set was just normal Moretti colours with lenses of the softest hues of corresponding transparent colours, the other set is a mix of silvered glass that was laying around my work table. the lenses on them were a very pale blue transparent. And a close-up of one of the silvered glass beads. I just love the way the dark Ivory went all crazy with little mosaic like patterns.

Enjoy! These are all for a submission next week to be part of an exhibition/sales opportunity, and will be converted into candle sticks ...