Herringbone Weave with Superduo Beads

Pattern now available on my etsy store! Here

Ever since I first came across superduo beads, I felt sure that they could be woven such that they made a herringbone pattern, just like brick pavements.
Looking on the net the closest that I could find was this, by the Potomac Bead Co (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XzkgPVH5cyo) but this also incorporated seed beads, so it was not what I was looking for, though it is a lovely design.

I found a gold bracelet that was exactly what I was looking for, but made of actual gold!

So with this inspiration in mind, I set about many failed attempts, and lots of wasted thread, before I cracked it.

First Successful Herringbone Weave.

It comes out a bit like knitting, in that you do a cast on row, several "knit" rows, and then a cast off row.

The next thing was to make it more interesting, by making it stripy and tying a knot in it...

...or by adding a picot edge. (Also covers the side threads)

..or by capturing a rivoli

So lots of variations then, though the rivoli capture is a bit fiddly, and reminds me of a shortbread biscuit!

What I need to know is if anyone else has come up with the same thing? It seems an obvious thing to do with a superduo bead to me, so I'm sure that someone else would have found this too.

So, if you have found this elsewhere please let me know! I would love know if it was unique!!

Bonne Perler

Please note this blog has now moved to my website: TooTallToBead.co.uk

Playing With Paisley

I currently have two patterns, Windows and Arches, and The Princess's Daisies that I have been exploring to find what other shapes and designs I can bend them into. 

I really like paisley shapes, they are naturalistic, and not symmetrical. Here are my first two paisleys, one in each pattern:

Paisleys made with my two patterns, windows and arches above, princess's daisies below.

To go with the top paisley I have made lots of different shapes that I am going to join together to make a lacy cuff, maybe it will come out a bit like irish crochet

To go with the bottom paisley I have brought a large swarovski triangle to be the centrepiece of a very glitzy necklace, and I would love to surround it with more paisleys, and riviol  bezels. 
It was pretty tricky to capture the triangle, I needed about three extra fingers to hold it in place! 

Centre piece, and beginning paisley for a glitzy necklace

Here's my sketch.

Huge Triangle necklace, initial sketches. 

I'll keep you posted with the latest developments!

Bonne Perler!

This blog has now moved to: TooTallToBead.co.uk

Windows and Arches, The Next Step?

Windows and Arches, The Next Step?

I have spent a couple of weeks teaching 'Windows and Arches' to my class. But I have been thinking about where to go with it next. I made a statement necklace that just uses the bracelet pattern up either side, then has a corner centre front and a dangle. The dangle gave me the opportunity to put a rivoli bezel inside a loop. 

Windows and Arches Necklace

Having added the bezel, I designed a bracelet with Arches and Bezels called 'I've Got My Eyes On You". I like the way that using dark purple beads on the bezels enhance the rich colours of the chatons. In fact I lost the first version of this, so I had to make a replica immediately as I was so pleased with the result. Someone out shopping had a lucky find!

I've Got My Eyes On You! Bracelet

The next step seems to be to explore celtic knot variations. 
Using a simple triangle knot (thanks Gerri for the idea), I made some variations, but I'm not sure that I am happy with any of them!
The question is whether to allow the strands to physically cross each other, which adds a dimensional element to the design, or to use a single window (little square filled with four bicones or 11/0 seed beads), to create a junction. Here are my variations:

           Little Fat Triangles        - Long Slim Triangles            - Over and Under Triangle

The little fat triangles are definitely no good because they don't lie flat. I quite like the Long slim triangles, but they would make a very wide bracelet, so maybe for a necklace. 
My current favourite is the over and under triangle. The problem with this one is that you need to use a stiff tension, and secretly join the overlaps to prevent it from being too unstable. (Instability is the curse of beadweavers!!!). All of the abovehave lost the lovely flow that the original design has. 
I also made a huge triangle knot necklace, using the four pane windows, and weaving the strands. With this I'm not yet happy with the way the strands wiggle as they cross over and under each other.  I will wear it to get some reactions, then maybe change the way that the strands weave.

Large Celtic Triangle Necklace

Maybe I'm just being fussy?

Or is it the scissors for this one?

Windows and Arches goes Three Dimentional

If you have been following me on Facebook, then you will know about my design 'Windows and Arches' which is a modular design where you first make the windows, then join them with the arches. This allows for many design variations.

The Original Bracelet

The Necklace Variation with added Rivoli Bezel

Last weekend it struck me that this can, of course, be applied to beaded beads. The main adaptation is that now the windows are triangular and pentagonal, as well as square. I substituted seed beads for the bicones that were in the original windows, and here is the result:

Left to Right: Tetrahedron, Octahedron, Cube, Dodecahedron and Icosahedron.

I couldn't help making each one slightly different. The cube has 4mm bicones in each corner, the Dodecahedron has a 12mm round rock crystal inside it, and the Octahedron has 8mm chatons framed inside four of the faces. This was by far the most difficult bit!

Placing an 8mm chaton inside the octahedron faces, very fiddly to do the last one!

Having done this exercise I found that for a square or triangle window, 11/0 seed beads are the best size, but for the pentagonal window 8/0 seed beads are best and very satisfactory!
Inspired be this I made another icosahedron, with four colours of window. To make sure that no two adjacent windows are the same colour, I had to print off an icosahedral net, and then colour in the points until I had solved this puzzle.

Finished Four Colour Icosahedron

And finally, when I had completed this one, I fancied doing a more lacy version, so I added a hexagon of 6 seed beads in each corner. This gives the effect of separating the faces more clearly, and making the hollow centre more obvious. Very pleasing :-)

Completed Lacy Icosahedron

Beaded beads necklace

The beaded beads make a lovely necklace, I squished the tetrahedron inside of the cube. Nice.