bangle – The Indecisive Beader

Wings……

I’ve finished my latest Contemporary Geometric Beadwork influenced piece – a large pointy bangle. The idea with this piece was to work with the ideas from CGB, but for the first time to ignore their finished pieces and patterns and see where I ended up. I also wanted to work with a tube of sweepings from Stitch & Craft, to free myself up from the hours I tend to spend selecting colours!

I started with a MRAW band which I thought would be roughly the right size for a bangle (I was wrong – it was huge), then added some increases and decreases to form a zig zag. I beaded that for a while, then added some increases halfway along each side to start to form peaks which I thought I could join together to start to shrink the piece down and make it human (rather than elephant sized)! I planned to add some crystals to join the peaks together, but when I tried it they didn’t work, and left the piece a bit too wobbly. After some unpicking I decided to stick to delicas, joined the peaks and beaded across either side of the join to make continuous lines and curves, surrounding the whole piece with a dark magenta metallic outline.

At that point I decided the original MRAW band wasn’t sitting correctly – the alternating zigs and zags meant that it needed to point in different directions so I couldn’t turn it into a CGB skirt to firm up the shape and make it smaller. So that got unpicked from the inside out, and I added a couple of rows of peyote in fuchsia metallics, and the decreases sorted the sizing out.

So it’s all done, and available in my Etsy shop. It’s also my entry for the Etsy Beadweavers Team October Challenge – ‘Abstract Painting’. If you’ve got a moment pop over to our blog and have a look at the other entries (or search ‘EBWC’ on Etsy). And if you could take a few seconds to vote for your favourite we’d really appreciate it.

Adapting

I’ve been making another Fortuneteller, but this time with size 10 delicas. I used my previous one as a template, measuring the various distances as I beaded along and at first it went well. However, as it grew it became clear that the bigger beads meant that the thickness of the MRAW band made the inner layer significantly smaller than the original, and finishing the joins between the small horns was definitely going to make it unwearable by me at least. So rather than hoping for a tiny handed customer, or giving it to one of the boys (boy 2 is very keen on bangles) I’ve made it into a rather splendid bowl and I like it. Which is just as well…………

Recipe

Size 10 delicas in three shades of red, one orange and silver, 26g in total.
Size 3.4 drop beads.

Tips

Unless you actually want to make a bowl, I’d suggest a starter MRAW band which contains six repeated ‘Vs’ with 9 units on each side of the V (not the 8 units I used).
To get the colour effect I used, start the MRAW band with the silver, using one of the reds as the fill bead. Add a drop bead as one of the inner beads on any increases or decreases (you may want to miss them on the decreases – I chose to leave them in as I like the look of the drop nestling in the V. Then change red/orange every row. As you approach the horns, start adding the odd silver in, then more each row until you are just using silver. I chose a random pattern, mirrored on each pair of horns, but kept it identical for each round so that the graduation was even across all the horns. Then gently fade the reds back in, and finally as you approach the final tips work the silver back in again.
Size 10 delicas are still quite hard to get hold of in the UK. Stitch n Craft are expanding their range gradually, and as usual offer probably the most competitive pricing (assuming you spend enough to qualify for free postage, which I never fail to do), although their colour range is still quite limited. Charisma have a good range of colours, as do Fine Lines.
Finally, with this kind of work, especially with larger beads, you really can’t make any mistakes as they will be very obvious on the finished piece. I made quite a few as I was very tired, and the lovely push pin and eraser combo I was sent by the lovely Jean Power with my copy of Geometric Beadwork 1 was worked quite hard. I can’t remember having to break out this many beads for ages.

Other than my general incompetence it worked really well with the size 10s, and in many ways it’s the best use of these for geometric beadwork that I’ve tried before. I will have a go at an actual bangle once I’ve got all the other things on my beading list moving along.

And another one……

Since I had the pliers out yesterday I finally got round to adding a clasp to a Sabine Lippert piece I finished beading a while back. It’s a Baroque Dimensional Bracelet and instructions are available for download from her website, and the simplicity and repetition made it a really lovely piece to make – but of course as with all Sabine’s pieces it looks absolutely amazing. It curves beautifully – both around the wrist and across the width of the piece, making it seem lovely and fat and chunky. Very pleased with this one.

Recipe

Fire polished beads 4mm Matte purple iris (from Etsy More Beads4U)

Fire polished beads 3mm Purple iris (from Robins Beads)

3.4mm drop beads Miyuki 401FR Black Matte AB (from Stitch N Craft)

Size 11 & Size 15 seed beads Miyuki 401FR Black Matte AB (from Stitch N Craft)

Fireline 6lb

Silver magnetic clasp, jump rings.

The Miyuki Black Matte AB are a current favourite as they are a kind of navy blue base, and I’ve not been able to find another good match for navy. For some reason I am wearing a lot of navy at the moment and it is certainly easier to work with than straight black.

Tips

I did 30 repeats as per the instructions, and it fits very nicely. The finished beadwork measures 20cm (without the clasps) although do bear in mind I am quite a tense beader.
On that note, relax, relax, relax your tension, particularly for the base layer. For me that means beading in a way which felt baggy, floppy and downright messy, but you need plenty of give in order to add the embellishing layers. This is common with embellished RAW pieces.
Otherwise as usual Sabine tells you everything you need to know……..

Next steps

Another good relaxing project, like the Faux Cro, I’m definitely going to make another one of these when I have assembled enough Fire Polished beads (it does use quite a lot). Perhaps this time I’ll go a bit wilder with the colours (I’m thinking some sort of outrageous red, pink and orange with lime highlights again). Or perhaps something bright but wearable instead.

And I’ve got the pattern for Sabine’s Tweed bracelet to do as well yummy yummy. Sabine has also put together some beautiful kits, and one day I will definitely treat myself……..

A quick comment about ordering from abroad before I get told off for listing MoreBeads4U: I usually try to stick with local suppliers – although sadly I don’t have any ‘normal’ bead shops selling teeny beads locally, I use UK mail order shops where possible (mainly Stitch N Craft and Robins Beads). However wonderful they are though, it isn’t possible for them to stock absolutely everything I need, and I have now found (through Etsy) a super supplier in Latvia for Czech beads (links above) – reasonable and prompt postage, and pretty much every colour and size of fire-polished beads I could want, competitively priced. So while I continue to use and support my lovely UK suppliers when they sell the colours and shapes I need, and will always look here first, I do sometimes have to go elsewhere. I don’t take this lightly, as shops like Stitch N Craft are so wonderful for the beading community – their class programme is probably the best in the world, they are very supportive of the Beadworkers Guild and bead groups and their range is absolutely wonderful. So their website will always be the first one I go to so that I can support them in return.

Of course one day I will open my own bead shop, sell everything I want and consequently go bankrupt in a year. But it will be fun.

Completion

A productive few days tidying up unfinished work and trying out ideas.

The bangle is a play on a Cellini spiral using some bigger beads – over 4cm at its’ widest it is good and chunky and fun. It took rather a long time to finish, largely because I kept running out of the larger beads. One important job (as well as photographing it properly and listing for the shop) is going to be to work out how many I actually used to avoid that problem next time. I have a plan for something even bigger in a rainbow of opaques, a bit like the Bright Star. Once the beads are selected the spiral stitch is very repetitive and restful, a nice change from more complex and creative work, so could be a good one for our next holiday.

The earrings are an exaggerated version of a basic brick stitch triangle with fringing – but again they are big and bold, scaled up to 12cm long. This gave me space for lots of different shades and makes me think of a firebird. I’ll try these again as well, like the spiral they are simple enough to be relaxing to make, but unlike it they take hours rather than months to complete. I think a dig around in my crystal stash could give some interesting additions as well. If only I didn’t have a small person who grabs everything he sees (glasses, hair, jewellery), then I could actually wear them……..

And finally I had another go at my ‘Saturday afternoon necklace’. Nearly right this time so I’ll tell you all about that soon. And I finished something else at the weekend but I honestly can’t remember what. I’ll blame the hot weather and the four teeth the baby is cutting for the epic memory failure.