Tuesday 24 June 2014

New pod shape and new glass

Yes I have new glass!


I went a little mad with my purchases, picked them up at flame-off and now finally getting round to trying them out. So more headpins, really loving making them!  

Practising different shapes and ideas, pods being one of them.

I've had a few breakages with them so there are quite a few I cant show you as the have cracked really badly.  Below are a few of my trials....



My new pod like shaped headpins in dark multi, these are also on brass wires




These 2 are a lovely dark teal transparent glass on copper wire


These  below are made using dark fossil glass another favourite glass that does its own thing!  I think I will make some in pod form too.  Yummy ....  but don't eat them!!







The fossil and the teal ones are now listed in my etsy  bead store.  The multi headpins are nearly ready for listing, I need some different photos of those too then they can go up.

So I will be busy listing over the coming days and get ready for my giveaway ........


watch this space ..................


E x





Saturday 7 June 2014

UFO's

No this is not a sci-fi post .......  UnFinished Objects or UFO's for short!!!

I do have lots of them but this one I finally finished as I have a buyer for it.

 
Tangled Rose Bangle in Teal


Originally it had a different look but I decided it wasn't really very wearable as it was, so I gave it a tweak and a rose seemed to materialise! I am really pleased with it now, my buyer fell in love with it instantly.





I love the colour of the weaving wire it really stands out on the coated copper base wire, its in a basket weave with a coiled end to finish each side.  My designs always seem to have an abstract or asymmetrical element somewhere in them, its my style and I love it!!



Just need to finish a few more now!!!  Ha ha!!

Till next time

E x



Friday 6 June 2014

Coring Chatelle Beads

Chatelle beads (if you don't know) are my big hole charm beads (5mm dia). Most people have heard of Pandora beads these are glass charm beads which thread straight onto the bracelet and they have a silver core to the hole.   I have named my charm beads 'Chatelles'. Can you see a connection to my ChatElaine Glass Art name?? 80))  Well I liked it!!


So I have been making Chatelles for sometime but unlike Pandora beads I don't silver core the holes. I have used grommets or rivets which you can glue into each end of the hole, these work ok but it depends on the hole width so can leave a gap in the middle of the hole core, not so good!!

However, I would like to core the beads properly but don't really have the right tools to do it. I decided last year to get some dapping punches as this was the cheaper option to achieve the coring because most of the coring tools/machines come from the USA. So getting them here is quite expensive with shipping of heavy equipment and the added customs charges probably on top as well, hence dapping punches!

Well now then, have I used them punches ...... N. O.  No!!

Couple of weeks ago a lampworking friend had a Meet-up at her place and guess what, she has a number of different coring machines and they were all out for us to try!!!  Yippeeeee!!!


She showed us how to use each one, what we needed to do and we were off 'out the blocks'   as quick as you like!!  Cutting the tubing to length, annealing the metal and into the machine to get it to lay down each side of the hole.

Here is my first bead cored in copper

 
Confritti  Heart in Pink with a little flower on the shoulder


I now have some copper tubing on its way and my dapping punches will get dusted off and taken out of the box!!  Very soon.

Been busy making beads lately so hope to have more to show you, hopefully, just so long as the kiln fairies are being kind.

Till next time

E x