I'm glad I came across this article as I was wondering if jewelry designers, to cut cost but not compromise design, were giving much thought to using less expensive metal beads.
The chart at the end of the writers comments gives an at-a-glance look at the make up and care of these low cost metal beads.
I hope you find this information useful.
I came across some links as I constantly scour blogs and other articles and realized these links could be very useful as many bead artists, designers, and Etsy sellers may be taking on some Spring cleaning as they either get ready to take the Summer off or get prepared to start selling again in September.
Free E-Book she just asks that you share the link Secrets of Savvy Etsy Sellers
Spring Cleaning Get Ready for Selling
Home Jewelry Business Success Tips
If I locate more I think I will update this post.
Apparently my grade school art teacher understood the history of Macrame as pointed out in this NYTimes article and taught us this fine art - I guess this tells my age because as we know art classes in public school is in itself history.
The pieces created were quite impressive, not basket hangers, or pot holders even bracelets, but elaborate bead and feather embellished wall hangings, and detailed wine bottle covers were what ended up being put on display at our local art museum in Montclair, NJ.
I kept up with the craft for a while and never did make a plant hanger.
So it's quite nice to see what's happening in fashion with this technique. Designers are making Macrame modern again by, from what can see, going back to it's roots - detailed, ornamental knotting.
Combining mesh, chiffon, silk-cotton cording into high-heeled sandals, dresses and vests. With designer's the likes of Jimmy-Choo commanding $2500 for a macrame clutch and macrame belts making it to the runway it looks like this trend will probably take off.
I've been anxiously awaiting any feedback from an attendee of this years Bead & Button Show and Marcia DeCoster is the first to post to her blog that I've come across.
I just took a brief look at a few of the links listed on her blog, and left my comments; but wanted to post her information here before returning and drooling over some amazing beads, and bead weaving.
I'm dyslexic and was more than relieved when I happened on beads as a business that I wouldn't have to attempt any type of jewelry designing; but, the more I learned about and handled the beads my artistic side started to wonder what I could accomplish with beads.
I wasn't crazy about just bead stringing and I knew I wanted to do something which had texture, and more dimension I guess than just stringing beads.
I was introduced to bead weaving or bead stitching as Ann Benson refers to this technique and fell in love with the possibilities instantly; only to realize that the written instructions may have well been in greek because I just couldn't make heads or tails of what they were trying to get across.
Then I figured, let me get some visuals that should do the trick, and again there always seem to be a step that I was missing or just could not understand.
Being dyslexic, a researcher and determined is a very useful combination as I don't give up easily and figured there had to be some instruction that could help me see what I was missing that my brain could wrap around and I discovered animated tutorials by Ann Benson.
As a result of seeing the animations I was able to finally learn the brick stitch - yeah!
That was about two years ago and we have a lot more interactive tools than the animated tutorials.
My new favorite is BeadTV for $3.95 a month, and Ann Benson's Beads East online store offers 11 free video and print tutorials and instructions as well as beautiful bead kits and beads.
