My Clear Glass Experiment

I have long loved the triangle bead – oh such a marvelous thing and then if you encase those lovely triangles – Just Wow! Is all I can say. 

 

I have long been frustrated by the 104 clear glass available.  I may fuss endlessly with a bead, but really -  I don’t want to fuss with glass.  I want it to go on smooth, I don’t want to clean or wash or pickle – and goodness knows I am not into that whole peeling – that is just not happening.

 

So, here is my experiment:

 

I vigorously rubbed the glass in the tail of my work shirt – that is all the cleaning any of them received.  I did peel off just the tip of each rod – it does get a bit scummy where it has been cut – but that was it!

 

I used basic colours – nothing fancy black, white, grey and turquoise. 

 

Each bead was made in the same fashion – the Zephyr one does have a little bit less clear than the rest of them. 

 

V.S. 04 Clear glass is from Italy – I got mine at Nortel, but I see that Frantz has it too.

Very clear and easy to work with.  The bead has a few micro bubbles. 

 

Tag – easy to work with and also very clear.  A few micro bubbles and a tiny bit of scum that you have to look really, really hard for. 

 

Effetre 004 – Easy to work with and also quite clear – some micro bubbles and also a tiny bit of scumming – but again, you really have to look for it. 

 

Effetre 006 – Easy to work with and quite clear – has micro bubbles and a bit of scumming – you don’t have to look too hard to see it. 

 

Double H – Zephyr – it is a joy to work with and very clear – it too has a small number of micro bubbles.  I cannot find any scum.

 

CIM – There is a crispness to this glass that I really like – but oh my the bubbles – the rod had one of those rivers of bubbles running the entire length of the glass.  Some of them popped along the way but you can see them.  Also this glass broke when I was in the middle of using it and then was really shocky for an inch or so.  It does actually seem to sharpen the encased triangles – I must note that there were two types of CIM packaging available – this one is the older stuff – you can tell that the tissue if a bit yellower – I recently made a bunch of beads very similar to these beads using a newer package of CIM and had some scumming, but no large bubbles and no shockiness either. 

 

These beads can be found residing with Jean at Nortel (just give me a couple of weeks to get out there and drop them off!)  Feel free to visit anytime and inspect them at your leisure.  

 

 

 

First Quarter Update

Well, if you put it that way, then I am not late - it is the end of the first quarter of 2012 - right on time!

I suppose this way there is so much more to write about.  It  has been a great start to 2012. 

I began focusing on the round shape - gearing up for doing a demonstration at this year's ISGB Gathering - I thought perhaps a round Ottoman bead would take less time.  Nooooo!  They can take tons of time. 

Of course, it all depends on how much detail one can put into a teeny tiny bead.

I still have not made up my mind exactly what pattern I will do for my demo.  Though I have determined that round does not necessarily mean less time.  I began playing with other shapes as well and got up the courage to do some twists.

I remember early in my beadmaking career, when I so wanted to encase a bead, but chickened out time and time again.  It is a pretty scary thing to spend all that time on a bead and then risk mucking it all up trying to perfectly encapsulate it in clear glass.  I also played with some old themes. 

More recently I have been experimenting with the bicone shape.  There is something so nice about a bicone.  Very appealing.

The first quarter has brought many exciting events.
My work has been accepted into the Bead and Button Bead Dreams competition.  I look forward to visiting my beads there in June.  I may even win a prize!

I was invited to participate in the PISMO Fine Art Glass Bead Invitational.  It is such an honour to be invited!  How I wish I could visit my beads there. 

My work was accepted into an ISGB show called Three by Two Jewelry Show.  The ISGB lampworkers were to make three beads that are all about the same size and shape.  These will be sent to  metal artists who are members of the Seattle Metals Guild (SMG).  Great works of art will be created.  The finished three pieces are then shared, one for each artist and one to be sold with the money benefiting the two organizations. 

These are the very beads I sent in.  We will get to see them this year at Gathering in Seattle.  Can't wait to see what they got turned into. 


There is more exciting news to come, but I better save something for another blog.

Here is some of the very most recent work.  More bicones and I found my stash of dichro - so I have put in a bit of sparkle.