One of the things people most often ask me is, ‘how do you come up with your ideas?’ Very often I don’t really know the answer to this. Sometimes, as with the Heatherwick Buttons project, the idea comes from an experience that has made an impact on me. Sometimes, it’s my reaction to a particular bead. Sometimes I deliberately seek inspiration, for example when I or a friend wears a new outfit that just seems to cry out for some jewellery: I look to the clothes to guide my design. This week, the inspiration came from a request from a lovely lady who has bought miniature beaded pieces from me in the past. It is thanks to her that I first designed a strawberry (look where that has now taken me!) and a bumble bee. Last weekend she asked if I could make a mushroom.
Never one to refuse a challenge, I blithely emailed back to say ‘I’m sure I can come up with something, just give me a few hours to think about it!’ Already the little cogs in my brain were whirring away, I turned to google images for some inspiration in the form of photos of real mushrooms and, before long, I had a plan in my head. Now this is the really scary bit: taking the beads out and trying to execute the plan. It is always the case that by this point, I have in my head a complete image of the finished project in a state of perfection. I suppose I’m almost inevitably setting myself up for disappointment as I find that the beads choose not to behave in the way I have planned and the end result is not quite the perfect object I have imagined. I think there’s a metaphor for life in there somewhere…Anyway, back to the mushroom! In this instance, my plan worked on techniques with which I am very familiar, used beads that I use all the time and, to cut a long story short, I was quite pleased with the results of executing this particular plan. More importantly still, the lady who had requested the mushroom in the first place, also liked my efforts. So I now find myself with another design that I rather like, but which came from a totally unexpected place and would probably never have materialised if it weren’t for that request last weekend.
Returning to my initial question, I have also realised that being part of different beading communities, both online and in the real world, is a huge source of inspiration. For anyone who wants to be wowed by great beading artists, take a look at ‘Battle of the Beadsmith’ the facebook community set up by Steven Weiss, owner of The Beadsmith. This has brought together amazingly talented bead artists from all over the world and the pieces that are posted on there are truly awe-inspiring. I also enjoy receiving the daily blog from Jennifer van Benschoten, editor of Beading Daily. Friday’s blog from Jen entertained me so much that I thought I would share an edited version with all of you. Entitled, ‘Warning! You might be a Beader’, Jen highlighted five tell-tale signs to identify beaders:
- You haven’t seen the surface of your dining room table (or another area of the house) for the past six months because it is covered in beads…I did clear my dining room table in readiness for Christmas, but I confess to other parts of the house being buried under beads!
- You’ve made a New Year’s resolution to buy fewer beads and start using the beads from your stash…Yes, but I’ve broken that one already in the January sales!
- You start six new projects before you finish the one on which you were originally working…I think the current count is four, but that’s only if I exclude the projects that I’ve started planning, not actually beaded yet!
- You have huge amounts of storage full of seed beads, but you don’t have just the right colour for the project you’ve just started…always guilty as charged I’m afraid!
- You would sooner spend your money on beads than on new clothes…Does it count that I can make some new clothes from the stash of material I already have at the bottom of my wardrobe?
So, having confirmed (as suspected) that I am, indeed, a beader and that I’m fortunate enough to know people who can feed my addiction by providing me with new inspiration every day, how about you? Would anyone else out there like to confess to any of the above…?
