wire art class Archives

Big beads deserve a special setting.

Have you ever struggled with setting focal beads? If you’re like me, you have at least one large, gorgeous bead tucked away that seems almost to beautiful and precious to use.

The problem with saving those special beads is that they never get the attention they deserve. In this post, I hope to inspire you to finally bring those gorgeous beads into the light by sharing some of the ways to listen to what your bead wants to become.

First, some inspiration!

Setting focal beads can be surprisingly easy when you ask the right questions. Any time I’m about to set a dramatic focal bead, I ask myself What’s the theme of this bead? In other words, what do I want to highlight and tell a story about? The bead might have a playful feeling that reminds me of blowing bubbles as a child. That image can inspire lots of creative details and use of color with accent beads and wire embellishments. Start with curiosity.

In the following examples, you can see how each bead inspires the setting and design:

I adore this bead with little birds in a row. I knew that I wanted them to be sitting in a tree, so this inspired the circular, leafy setting around it.
Bead Artist: Jessie Tesolin

This unicorn bead by Keri Fuhr reminded me of a carousel horse. While I didn’t want a literal amusement ride, my thought is a setting of whirls and swirls to convey movement.
Bead Artist: Kerri Fuhr

I love dragons, can you tell? This baby dragon has quite a personality and seemed very royal to me. Befitting a prince, I gave him a formal and ornate setting.
Bead Artist: Kerri Fuhr

With this beautiful heron lampwork bead, the place where these birds live inspired a setting that evokes water and reeds. The setting echoes swirls of water and aquatic plants.
Bead Artist: Kerri Fuhr

This stunning collection of focal beads needed a dramatic setting that would highlight their beauty without concealing a single detail. The resulting piece, Breatplate for Ninsun, was an entry for Bead Dreams a few years ago and one of the first times I played with a really special setting.
Bead Artist: Gail Crosman Moore

BreastPlate for Ninson wire art necklace (c) Melanie Schow

This is a character bead—almost cartoon-y—and it didn’t really need anything fancy. Instead, the setting is made up of just a few accents that pull in the bright ketchup and mustard colors.
Bead Artist: Tammy Mercier

Second, a challenge and a class!

By starting with curiosity, you can create magic. If you struggle with setting focal beads or have a few languishing, I challenge you to spend some time looking at each one to see what themes or stories it brings up. How you would use your artistic skills and techniques to highlight them?

You’re invited to try setting focal beads with me! If you’re close to California, consider attending my upcoming July class at Creative Castle called Framed: A Dramatic Wire Setting.

In this one-day class, you’ll bring a focal bead you love (or buy one there) and learn how to use your skills to highlight its unique-ness and beauty. With my guidance, you’ll design a custom setting that frames and really shows off your treasure. I can show you how fun setting focal beads can be! Whether it’s stone, pictorial, or beautiful glass, you will end up with a bead that shines—and new confidence to work through your neglected stash.

See full details here!

Give your focal beads some love

Are you ready to be brave and creative setting focal beads? Open up the stash soon and discover how fun it can be to listen to your beads.

A new wire art class

For the first time in six years, I’m offering a new advanced wire art class! It will feature creative skills for working with wire including bending, embellishing, shaping, adding hanging elements, and balancing a piece. I’m very excited! Here’s the first of two samples, this one is in silver:

Designing a class is an art

Not surprisingly, the process of designing a class requires creativity too.

The name of the class is Meander. Being a lover of words, the first thing I did was look up the definition and make notes about the descriptive words. This set the tone as I wrote the class description and made a list of materials.

Artists who teach likely have two general strategies for preparing a class–a chicken and egg approach, if you will. The first way is to create a piece with a specific class in mind, taking careful notes along the way, step by step. The other approach is to create a finished piece and then think, “Hey! This would make a great class!” This is more challenging because you must reverse-engineer the creation process from memory so that students have clear instructions.

When I create art pieces, my primary focus is always to ask “is this sturdy and stable?” I hardly ever think about the order I did it in. Fortunately, for the Meander class, I did it the first way and have good notes.

New wire art skills and techniques

In the past, I’ve taught classes that feature a specific project that participants walk away with. I’m excited that this advanced class focuses exclusively on students pushing the limits of wire, embellishments, and balance. Instead of a carbon-copy, students develop their confidence in creating an original piece using the techniques discussed in the class.

Since I last taught a class, I have learned new skills from the art I’ve been making. Sometimes wire does unexpected things in the course of producing new work. I am eager to share these discoveries with students. One of the other departures in this class is the option of rhinestones – something sparkly – instead of my more usual pearls or beads (I’m more of a monochrome designer, but hey sparkles, what’s not to like?). We’ll be playing with curves where you can choose to add rhinestone chain (among other things!).

One of the signs of artistry is being able to develop your own design aesthetic and learn to trust your own sensibilities. This class will be an aesthetic challenge for participants to discover what’s pleasing to them. To answer that age-old question: “How do I know when I’m done?” For all these reasons, I can’t wait to teach the class in January!

Learn more about my newest wire art class!

Want to see a second sample piece in copper and read about the class? Visit Creative Castle’s websit e.

Inspiration for setting focal beads