From The Serengeti To Neptune’s Net

It feels like I’ve been particularly busy this week making beads – which is fine by me since I love it so much! I believe a lot of my enthusiasm has to do with working with the style of beads you see. These are more organic and freeform in nature, yet all the random colors and patterns are captured within a perfect round shaped bead. This contrast of design is something I am drawn to making again and again.

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SERENGETI: Lots of sparkle, shine and reactions going on in this bead. The glittering goldstone stringer against the deep topaz glass, shiny silver, and multicolored glass shards reminded me of the Serengeti plains in Africa at twilight.

NORTHSHORE: I’m sure you can tell right away why I named this bead after a popular surf spot in Hawaii. The reactive glass shards I used here bloomed into this wave-like shape with bright ocean colors.

NEFERTITI: When working with this bead I initially had a completely different name in mind for it. But once I took the bead out of kiln the bead had come to life with so many richer colors than I expected. Also, the shape of the shards looked very egyptian to me, even resembling the famous bust of Nefertiti herself.

FEATHER: With the deep raking and the wispy streaks of color that developed in the reactive silver glass, the name Feather just suited this bead perfectly.

NEPTUNE’S NET: It is so much fun to watch some of these reactive glasses come to life in the flame! The interaction between the base glass and the silver glass in this bead, produced this beautiful net-like pattern. With its pale carribbean blue color, I thought the name Neptune’s Net was fitting.

NAPA: This bead has a base of deep, rich true eggplant colored glass which is just beautiful against the reactive glass shards which developed into shades of celadon, chartreuse, aqua and teal. As if that wasn’t enough, the eggplant base glass peeked through the reactive glass creating what looked to me like little clusters of grapes, hence the name NAPA after Napa Valley, CA.

PERSIMMON: Here’s another bead that I originally had planned to name something different until I removed it from the kiln. The colors in this bead range from a true persimmon, to a light apricot and a soft coral. Set against a creamy light ivory background makes this bead especially beautiful in it’s simplicity.