Friday 16 October 2015

New Chilli bead!

Hello everyone!

I'm here with news of the new Chilli™ bead which has recently been launched by the PRECIOSA Traditional Czech Beads brand. Once again I was fortunate enough to be involved in creating some promotional pieces using the new beads and so I spent a couple of happy weeks turning them this way and that and having a whole lot of fun with them. The Chilli measures 4 x 11 mm and is a narrow elongated bead with a flat edge and two holes which you can see in the picture below.


I've worked with a lot of shaped beads in the last few years and one of the things I particularly liked about the Chilli bead is that it works well with either the convex or concave side uppermost, or even on its side. Modern beads come in such a wonderful range of colours and finishes that it's nice to be able to admire them from every angle and so for the first piece I made I captured an upturned Chilli between pairs of Chilli beads on their side and then added a cluster of them in the centre with the curved side on top. I used a base of black Ultrasuede and a liberal sprinkling of chrome seed beads to complement the lovely mottled black and silver finish of colour number 23980/15481 and then turned it into a brooch.



I liked the way this piece turned out and so I made another very similar piece using Chilli beads in colour number 23980/86800 which has a really nice speckled finish. Again I used black Ultrasuede as a backing, but this time with slightly smaller black seed beads and a burst of shiny silver seed beads in the centre for a touch of drama. Rather than a brooch I turned this one into a pendant by creating a hanging loop of seed beads and threading a length of black satin ribbon through it.



For the next piece I used silver Chilli beads (colour number 00030/27000) with shiny silver seed beads and black Twin beads to make some star-shaped components. Because the Chilli beads have two holes they mix perfectly with the other two-holed beads and so Chillies and Twins are a match made in heaven. I attached the individual components together using jump rings and some more Twin beads as connectors and then whipped up a pair of matching earrings to complete the set.

 



As much as I love the classic black and silver combination, I wanted to introduce a little more colour and femininity into my final design and so I decided to make a romantic flower bracelet. For this one I used some beautiful transparent purple Chilli beads (00030/15781) and a lovely transparent pale blue (00030/14464) and mixed them with silver seed beads. I popped an 8 mm crystal AB fire polished bead into the centre of each one and attached the completed flowers to a simple herringbone rope.



There is a Flickr album full of stunning photos of Chilli bead pieces made by other designers which you can scroll through for inspiration and you can also see the full range of colours and finishes available in this album. Preciosa has four free Chilli bead projects available to download from their website and some stores around the world already have the new beads in stock too so you can get started right away. Don't forget that Preciosa is always happy to see your designs using their beads, so be sure to show them your Chilli bead creations via their Facebook page.

See you next time!

Kerrie

Friday 2 October 2015

Safari Rings!

Hello everyone!

Although I love the freedom of being a one woman freelancer, I often find it frustrating that there is nobody to share the workload and help out with the boring stuff (like doing accounts, taking photos and updating websites) leaving me free to bead all day, every day. This means I don't get as much time as I'd like to work with all the wonderful beads available out there and I have to be a bit careful about what work I take on, however I am still happy to be a design team member for Many Hands Marketplace - Kazuri West as helping to promote the work of the Samunnat and Kazuri ladies is very important to me. So I am glad to report that Bead and Button magazine has recently published my 'Safari Ring' project in the October 2015 issue of the magazine. And look - and there's even a tiny thumbnail picture of the project on the cover!


This is a very simple project designed purely to show off those fabulous animal print Kazuri buttons  - just one netted ring band (either narrow or wide) made with Preciosa Ornela seed beads and a variety of interchangeable buttons that you can snap on and off to suit your outfit or your mood. Perhaps one day you feel a little bit cheeky cheetah, another day could be an elephant kind of day (and we all have those!) or maybe it's a roaring lion type of day - make a ring in a couple of hours and go on your own personal safari!


I was pleased to read that in her editor's note, the editor of Bead and Button wrote "For a piece that is pure fun, try Kerrie Slade's adorable "Snappy safari ring", consisting of an easy netted ring with interchangeable snap-on animal print buttons. Love it!" as that is exactly what this project is all about. It's not technically challenging, it won't win any prizes and it doesn't take a week to make but hopefully it will inspire you to take a look at the lovely hand crafted Kazuri animal print buttons and perhaps purchase a few to help to support the disadvantaged ladies who make them.

See you next time!

Kerrie



Friday 28 August 2015

5th BEADERS BEST Bead Art Fair - show update!

Hello everyone!

So a couple of weeks ago I was writing a blog post about the build up to the 5th BEADERS BEST Bead Art Fair in Germany and now here we are the other side of it. I spent nearly 4 months preparing for the show (creating designs, writing patterns, making samples, practicing etc.) and to say I was nervous beforehand would be an immense understatement - right up until an hour before the show started I was seriously considering quite literally running away because I doubted my own ability to put on a convincing performance. But with the support of my husband Simon, the Preciosa Ornela team, the show organisers and some wonderful beading friends, everything ran smoothly and I would imagine that visitors to the show had no idea how I very nearly wasn't sitting there showing them how to make Pipflinks, Candles, Ripple Crown Pins and Kumihimo bracelets! Of course I know I can bead, I can write patterns and I can teach, but it was the unknown factor of doing public demonstrations at a large fair for a huge company that scared me, but of course I was worrying unnecessarily and now, looking back, I would even go so far as to say I enjoyed it and that I wouldn't hesitate to do it again! You can read my more formal review of the show over on the Bead and Button blog, but this is a simple personal post, showing a selection of pictures that tell the story of when Kerrie Slade went to the 5th BEADERS BEST Bead Art Fair.

Me with some of the fantastic Preciosa Ornela team, just before the show opened.

Talking to the wonderful Olga Vinnere Pettersson from Sweden minutes before the doors opened. Olga has an aura of calm and tranquillity about her and she kindly passed some on to me - along with some lovely Swedish chocolate!

This giant poster of my 'Pipflinks' design never failed to make me smile and remind me of just why I was there. I love how Preciosa kept my made-up word for the name of the project!

This is how much of my time was spent, sat at the Preciosa stand doing demos of my four projects alongside their very talented in-house designer Helena Chmelikova. In this shot I am chatting to the great Francesca Walton and her lovely friend Suzanne.

Of course sitting at the back of the booth gets boring, so I would often go to the front and talk to beading friends and visitors - here I am chatting to Gerlinde Lenz about her new beading book.

Day one finished with an excellent barbecue. Simon and I sat with the Preciosa team and the US designer Adele Rogers Recklies and her husband - a really lovely evening!

Day two held more of the same but the fair was much busier and went in a whirl of demos and mini workshops for me. Here I am showing a couple of ladies how to do Kumihimo.

I met lots of wonderful beading ladies during the fair and this is an example of just one of the many photos that were taken of us all. Take a look at Nadya's amazing necklace (far right).

Sunday was the third day of the fair and I think you can see from this photo (taken by the talented Sandra Scholte) that by now I had relaxed into it and was enjoying myself!

Towards the end of the show Freddie Ott (the creative director of Perlen Poesie magazine) took this picture of me wearing 'Garden Party' the necklace that made the cover of the current issue. I had no idea this was going to happen so it was lucky I happened to be wearing a matching top that day!

If you had given me a crystal ball before the show and let me glimpse this picture, I would not have believed my eyes! At the end of the fair I joined in with the fashion show and paraded on the catwalk wearing my necklace. Note to self - if you can do that, you can do ANYTHING!

At the end of the three day event, me and Simon on our hotel balcony sharing a little toast.

So there you have it - three days in twelve pictures! Despite all my apprehensions this turned out to be a really fantastic experience for me. So if you ever find yourself in this situation and think 'Should I? Could I?' please, just say 'YES!'

See you next time!

Kerrie