Beading Inspiration

Inspiration is one of those elusive things that we ask designers about, seek out ourselves and basically can be quite hard to define. Don’t worry, I’m not about to go all philosophical on you, but I do have a couple of things to share and it occurred to me that they both fall under the category of beading inspiration in one way or another.

Some Beading Inspiration for me

A couple of weeks ago I had the opportunity to go and seek out some new inspiration. Periodically (and to be honest, not often enough) a group of beaders meet up for an exhibition at the V&A. Jean Power is usually the organising force behind these meetings and they are nothing more formal than a shout out on Facebook to see if anyone is around and interested in going to an exhibition.

In this instance, the exhibition in question was ‘Bejewelled Treasures‘, the Al Thani Collection at the V&A (Victoria and Albert Museum). The exhibition is a collection of exquisite jewels that have all been made in India, inspired by India or are otherwise connected to India. Some date back hundreds of years and are closely intertwined with the history of the country, oftentimes the period during which it was under British rule. Some of the beautiful jewels on display came from the collection of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II. The exhibits included stunning diamonds, sapphires and rubies, exquisite gold work and craftsmanship. Suffice to say, there was plenty of elegance, sparkle and incredible beading inspiration, from colour combinations to ornate designs, to jewellery styles. I can highly recommend that you pay this exhibition a visit. It is running until 10th April 2016 and you can find all the details here.

I would like to go on and say that this wonderful experience has led me to come home and create a new collection of jewellery. I have just created a new collection…more on that below…but I’m afraid it has no bearing on the exhibition, although that’s not to say that the inspiration I found here won’t be manifesting itself in future! I just need some time to digest and let those beautiful jewels feed into my own ideas.

Meeting up with fellow beaders also makes for a great day out. We all tend to work on our own and spend a lot of time living with our own fears and insecurities about our abilities, not to mention the practical dilemmas that we all face. So it can be very good to get together and talk beads. And boy did we talk! Somehow or other three or four hours passed as we sat in the V&A café talking beads! We covered everything from our favourite suppliers and manufacturers to comparing notes about writing up tutorials, teaching workshops, facing the disappointment of having workshops cancelled, copying designs (other people copying us, not the other way round!) and all manner of other bead-related issues. It is always comforting to know that I’m not the only one whose workshops don’t always run – it can feel as though my work isn’t good enough, or I’m making bad choices of projects, when in reality there are a hundred other factors that feed into whether or not workshops run. However, we did all conclude that the beading industry isn’t in the same happy place that it was a few years back. Whether this is a reflection of economic circumstances, the huge impact that the internet has had, or just the natural waxing and waning of interest in beads, I don’t know, but it is a sobering thought. So thank goodness for those who are still supportive and rest assured those of us who are so passionate about beads will be sticking around to keep the beading inspiration going. Which brings me neatly onto the second piece of news I want to share…

Beading Inspiration for You

I’m hoping that this won’t be news for all of you. I’ve been seeing posts and shares on Facebook about a wonderful sounding Bead Retreat to be held in France in June. Unfortunately I’m already engaged to be somewhere else that weekend, or I would be there in a heartbeat! The idea of wonderful countryside and accommodation, beads and (hopefully) sunshine is a winner. The Bead Retreat is being run by DiMarca, so I’m just going to share the information that Marca Smit has passed on to me:

DiMarca Bead Retreat is an All-Inclusive Long Beading Weekend: – 4-Night Accommodation in cottages at Domaine de Romefort in France (3.5 hours south of Paris) – 3 Full Days of Workshops (by Ulrike Günther, Akke Jonkhof and Crystal Tinker) – Breakfast Buffet/Lunch Buffet/Dinner – Shopping opportunity with 10% discount at DiMarca Online – Shopping opportunity with 10% discount on the patterns of the Designers – Evening gatherings, time to chat and bead – Trip and guided tour to Porcelain Factory – Trip to a typical French ‘Vide Grenier’ (Garage Sale) – Beady Goody Bag

The workshops are in English.

Very easy access by plane, train or car. If you come by plane or train, we can pick you up from Limoges (20 minutes from us).

Registration and more information through the website: www.beadretreat.eu Our FB page: https://www.facebook.com/DiMarca-Bead-Retreat-636936596448777/

If you have any questions, please let us know!

There aren’t many places left I know. Unsurprising as the retreat offers wonderful tutors teaching some really stunning designs, as you can see from the photo! (If it’s not displaying in full – just click on the image to see all the wonderful designs!)

I don’t know how many people think about the logistics of running workshops, but I sometimes have disappointed people emailing me when a workshop has been cancelled. The trouble is, very often tutors are travelling long distances, need accommodation and the organisers will be paying for this. All the travel and overnight arrangements need to be made some time in advance, so there comes a point when the organisers have to take the decision as to whether a workshop is going to be financially viable. This decision can be taken up to two months before the workshop will run, so if you are thinking about booking onto any workshop at any time, don’t leave it until the last minute or you may find you are missing out – not because there weren’t places available, but because the organisers simply didn’t realise that enough people were actually interested to allow the event to run.

Lastly…Beading Patterns to Inspire!

I mentioned in my own beading inspiration that I had a new collection of jewellery to share. Well, most of this month so far has been taken up with a self-imposed project to get to grips with Chilli Beads. If this is a new bead type in your vocabulary, then you can find out all about them in this blog. I know that these beads have been around for a little while and I think they have captured a lot of imaginations as I have received emails from Bead and Jewellery Magazine readers asking me to include some Chilli beads projects. There will be some coming up in future issues of the magazine, but I thought I should also carry out a personal exploration of these beads.

I am happy to report back that I have found them lovely to use – inspiring, fascinating and frankly, just a tiny bit addictive. So, last night I published my first four patterns using Chilli beads: a little jewellery collection! There are going to be more to come, but I hope for now that these will inspire you to go and try a new bead if you haven’t already done so.