Saying it with flowers....

Well the first orders are trickling in for Christmas.

This custom order was great as it allowed me to experiment with encased flowers (which I love!

First I made a number of small thin sticks of  glass called 'stringers' as shown below: The green one in my hand was used to make the 'stem' colour behind the flowers on some of the beads.

Next I had to set up a couple of critical bits of equipment for the task.....Do you see the silver cylindrical things by the sides of the torch... These are my special arm rests for delicate work; (which are two toilet rolls wrapped in silver foil!!) Very important and very technical as you can see!!!

God! Looking at it there, it looks like a right mess! All I can say is when I'm mid-project, the glass rods go everywhere (much worse than this) as you just tend to grab for the thing you need and then drop that and move on to the next; there's not much room for order when molten glass is in your hand!)

The close ups you are about to see all use the same method to make but the petal colours were different sizes and colours. The beads all started off life as a minuscule white mini-bead on the mandrel. Then I added a clear layer (quite thin), then the stem layer. Next, white was laid on to the bead to provide a backdrop for the coloured petals, then the petals. A bit of shaping of the petals was next. Finally a deepish coat of pure clear glass encased the whole lot... Ta Da!!!

This is either a forget-me-not or an iris depending on how you see it..

Little violet

pansy

primrose? (I know it should have 5 petals..)

briar rose

I think the red and pink is my favourite. (Something about the colour combo I think)

Here is the set all finished and ready to be a nice Crimbo pressie:

I know that in the end the Christmas build up will be chaos (it was last year), but if any of you lovely people have any particular requirements that you know of now in the way of glassy, beady presses, please let me know in good time as most pieces will take at least a week to turn around. (by the time I've made it at the torch, then kilned it, cleaned it, done the glass work, and then the silver work and mounting after).

I am planning to be at the Oldfield School Christmas fair again (if they'll have me). It's on the 5th of December which is a Friday from 6pm to 8pm in Maidenhead.

Maybe see you there... x

                                       

Endless Ocean...

Glass and water, water and glass.., a mouthwatering combo any day of the week...

Waterworld....Do you remember that film?

Do you remember that AMAZING blue of the sea, and even better, soooo much sea going on for miles and miles? I know the film itself might be a bit cheesy but I really liked it (is that bad?) and these beads I'm going to show you remind me of that endless ocean feeling that you get from that film!

Ooh and better mention.... these aren't sold yet, so if anyone likes the look of them then they will be coming on to the Etsy shop soon. www.etsy.com/shop/meadowhawkglass.



OK. So this first bead is made with reactive silvered glass and then has a collage of layered colour on top to bring depth to it. (I really liked this one while I was making it and knew it would be pretty in the end when it came out of the kiln).

side view showing the greenier bits

side view showing the pretty star-shape made with the layers of watery glass colours

other side view showing the bluier bits

So bead number two is also made with silvered glass but a different type. We are more in the shallows and rock pools again (you know how I love a good rock pool)!!!

 

this bead has a ring of bubbles just on the one side

And lastly we are back in deeper waters. There is a bit more turbulence here and you might think you see something green and glowing but the next time you look from a different angle it feels like its gone! 

The bubbles of air alternate around this bead creating movement in the glass under the surface!

light shining straight through the bead

the waters are still again..

Here are all three beads together as they might appear on a bracelet...

That's all for now folks. Better get back in that workshop.... xx

It could just be my impression but.....

When you get a message like this....

"I was wondering if you could make some beads which are inspired by my favourite paintings..." 

well, my mouth started watering and the torch began to beckon..... oooh I thought; you've just got to have a go haven't you!?

Well, I was very taken by the idea but didn't quite know where to begin... I love it when someone asks me to do something that I'm not sure that I can do..All worried and excited all at the same time...



Now,  if you want to do a little quiz then don't scroll down yet!

Study the pictures of the three beads below carefully:
Which three paintings do you think these beads in the pictures are inspired by............ 
no peeking too far down the page mind, till you've had a guess!! 

(Clue: Think Impressionism and Post-Impressionism)

Have you had a guess? 
OK now we can scroll on     ;-)









ANSWERS:

The three fave paintings were:

Van Gogh - Starry Night
Klimt - The Kiss
Monet - Water Lilies and Japanese Bridge. 

Did you guess right???


The fab request for the beads came in during the summer holidays, so I waited a couple of weeks for the kids to go back to school, having momentary google flicks to the millions of renditions of the said paintings to study them a bit, then I had a play..



VAN GOGH

This one I found the easiest of all for some reason. I think because the swirl of the sky lends itself to the swirl of the glass and the colours were clearly in my head so I could translate them to glass colours straight away. You know how much I love the night sky.... ;-). So here's the finished bead.

It was great to get that movement and the spirals helped me to get the impression of the brush stroke direction which in some areas seems pretty deep so I used plenty of clear encasing glass! Finishing them with sizeable bubbles, I hope adds to the feeling of a 'lightness of hand' which I think comes across so much in this painting.

KLIMT

This one I found crazy hard to do. (Loads of attempts)... I think it is because there are so many contradictions in the painting so there are many very different aspects all vying for their special piece of attention... Round female shapes and swirls, masculine blocks and straight lines (which don't really lend themselves to glass!) This is where I got to:

I liked the way the black and ivory section mirrored the section on the 'mans side' on the left and the way the glass webbed I got those kind of squarey bits I was after. Of course, the other main constituent had to be plenty of glittery gold to bring it to life.

MONET

Here is the Monet bead.  I wanted to get an idea across of the brush strokes and the watery-ness in the painting, the depth and the colours (Soooo many colours here to give credence to!!) I love the end result, but phew... I definitely kissed a few frogs before I came across this one sitting on my lily-pad!

I ended up looking at the texture and colours on the water (sort of bottomy-right in the painting), I really wanted to capture that beautiful almost iridescent blue there.

That's it for now folks as it is really late. (I've got more stuff to show you but it will have to wait till another day..)

Night x