Beading In The Dark

Having finished one new version of my Geometric 1-9-1 pendant I was itching to rush on with another one and grabbed another crystal as well as some cylinder beads which all looked as though they worked together and got to beading.

Come the morning and better light it was obvious the combination didn't work too well- but what to do?

The crystal I had chose was black on one side with a blue/ green coating on the back - or so I thought.
The main cylinder beads I chose were almost black with a subtle green sheen- again this was what it looked like to me late at night in the dark.
The other cylinder beads were a gold which I felt would zing out between the dark colours- can you guess where this is going?

Fortunately I stopped beading before I secured the crystal in which meant I got to have a good look at it in the daylight and my errors soon became apparent:
The crystal was indeed black but the back was definitely blue/ silver- no green in sight.
The main cylinder beads were definitely a forest green.
The gold cylinders were definitely a red/ brown.
The combination just did not go!


Well, the black on the front looked ok but the back of the work was all wrong and in a double-sided pendant I wanted to get it right. The beadwork was warm and green with gold and the crystal was cool with blue and silver.

What to do?

Fortunately I had a few other crystals (good job I was so indecisive when buying them and bought all I liked!)

You can see the fronts of the crystals here:

The backs of the crystals here:


As the beadwork wasn't finished I was able to put in the crystals to see what each one would look like:

The green I felt was far too "limey" with a big hint of silver for the forest green in the beadwork.



I liked the amber/ brown but if I had been going to choose this colour from the start I would have swapped the green and brown in the beadwork as I like the outline of the star pattern to really stand out and I was worried it would be lost against the crystal. In real life the crystal look smuch darker and more closely resembles the brown cylinder beads.



The clear had too much of a lilac look to it which just didn't go at all.


So I was still wondering what to do.

In the end I settled for the green and hoped it would work.

But a few rows on I just wasn't happy. The greens didn't work together and I hated it.
Deep down I knew the only combination which would work was the amber crystal and I threw away all my prejudices about wishing I had swapped over the colours in the scheme and out the crystal in and carried on beading.

A few rows on...

I loved it!

The colour scheme works perfectly and I am pleased to say that the star outline still stands out as although the colours of the cylinder beads and the crystal are close the fact that one is so transparent whilst the other is opaque means they look different.

Geometric 1-9-1 version 2

When I first beaded my Geometric 1-9-1 back in early 2009 I used browns and golds as these were the colours of the crystals and small cylinder beads I had access to.

Ever since then I have wanted to bead another one in less sublter colours and finding some great crystals in New York recently as well as teaching it as a class was all the incentive I needed.

This one I beaded using a very light, transparent green cylinder bead combined with a steel-grey/ silver hex bead.

The crystal I chose is clear but has a gold/ green coating on the back which gives it a great light green/ gold AB shine.

As the green cylinder beads were so transparent I used a dark green thread throughout to ensure they would not "lose" any colour as I used them.

On the back of the piece I added extra rows using the contrast bead as I wanted to see it more and also as I wanted to see less of the crystal for an experiment in how that changed the look.

On the finished piece the silver beads look as though they are actually gold/ bronze as they reflect the green and gold of all the surrounding beads so much- no silver in sight!

More Gaudi Colours

After my recent experiments with Gaudi colours on my geometric vessels I have decided to bead some more of them in a different shape but with the same colours.

For these I decided to bead two different ones which are exactly the same size, shape and colours- the only different being that I would reverse the colours scheme.



The first pendant uses a very light, white cream as the main colour with a mix of the oranges, blues, black and yellow that I used for my previous pendants.

The second pendant swaps around the scheme with the mix of colours being much more dominant with the end result that the cream looks a lot whiter and even "harsher" with the lines seems to jump out from the vessel.