Beading & Felting

Beading & Felting

Comments 11 comments

Beading and Felting

I know there are some spectacular bead artists out there and this week I thought I’d try my hand at some beading, I’ve been following Robin Atkins blog called Bead Lust

http://beadlust.blogspot.com.au/

 Her work is so beautiful. I’ve never really wanted to learn about beading before but since getting into more of the mixed media side of things it’s made me more interested in the beading process, of course not on the scale of Robins though , just enough to try to work into my pieces.  Robin has been beading for a long time and she has written a couple of books, she has now put out her first book as a free book for anyone to read, so since I was following along I thought I’d take the time to read it.  She explains her methods of beading and basically works free hand with no pre conceived ideas, or nothing set in stone.  So having read that I thought I’d give a small piece a go, mind you I don’t have thousands of beads to choose from so I started this little one with one of Zed’s hand made buttons and went from there.

It definitely helped to read her book as I was under the impression that I should have some sort of design in mind before I started, but I actually found it so much easier not to.  This is only a small piece I know but reading her book  gave me the courage to have a go !!

I’ve also made a couple of small note book covers, inspired by Zed once again, and I wanted to  do something else with my flat pieces of felt and not just wall hangings.  The first cut was the hardest I must admit, spending all that time rubbing and rolling the felt only to cut it up in the end. These 2 covers were made with the one piece and then cut in half so I had the 2 different colours in each cover.

I then embellished with embroidery stitches learned from the TAST 2012, so I used Blanket, Fly & Cretan stitches and then added some beads in too.

I did not have any success with creating skeleton leaves so we’ll leave that for another day lol

I hope everyone’s had a productive week and I’d love to hear what you’ve been up to.

11 thoughts on “Beading & Felting”

  2. Nice work Karen, I will have to go look at the blog and the free book. I have lots of beads and would like to use them more.

    Reply

  3. The beading and the notebooks are gorgeous Kaz 🙂
    I should try to use beads more now I’m learning stitches.
    I wish I had had a productive week, but I tried making a vessel with a flat resist and balloon and got black bamboo tops stuck all over my fingers 🙂

    Reply

    1. Thanks Zed Yes im sure you have tons of beads to play with, sorry you had trouble with your vessel , would wearing gloves help stop the bamboo sticking ??

  4. Zed, re. felting over a balloon – have you tried putting a little water into the balloon before inflating it? You have to be a bit careful – first time I did it, all the water blew back into my face! However, if you then turn the balloon – so the ‘pointy’ end is down and supported by a small bowl – the weight of the water makes the resist more stable. Keeping it all quite wet (with towel to hand, to keep hands dry for pulling off fibre) seems to make it easier to apply the layers. Does this make sense????

    I’m useless at beading, never seem to get the effect I want – then that’s because I need more stock!!! 😉 Husband says, “No way!” However, I’m in the process of making a Diary cover, with a bit of embroidery as embellishment. Not sure whether or not I like it, but I’m not as dedicated as kaz, and I’m certainly not going to start unpicking, especially the bullion stitches!

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    1. LOL Judith Not fair, i shouldnt be the only one unpicking lol   we need pics on the forum 🙂  

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  5. Judith, I started out using a flat resist, then finished fulling over the balloon (I did fill with water 🙂 ), and then I used it to shape the bowl as it dried. Usually, I use a ball bladder, and do it a similar way to how you suggest, but I thought I’d give this a go before I attempt a pod.

    Kaz, the black bamboo was really staticy for some reason and just wanted to fly everywhere 🙂

    Reply

  6. Lovely notebook covers Karen. You have been very restrained. I tend to overdo my beading and don’t know when to stop. lol. Thanks for Robyn’s link. Will investigate with glee!!

    Reply

    1.   Thanks Liz I’m sure as i get more comfy using beads i’ll overload them and then have to bring it back,  or unpick lol   

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