Why is your Artisan Jewelry "so expensive"? The artists and process behind art beads and artisan jewelry.(May 5th, 2018)

Hello beautiful souls,

This is kind of part 2 of explaining the creative process of bead making, jewelry making, and other artists bead making process. Here you will see a  behind the scenes look at how beads are made, the artists that make them before the jewelry design is born. To see part 1 of "Why are you lampwork beads "so expensive"? Creative process behind  the creation of lampwork bead making  click here.

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Here is my tray of art beads I purchased at Bead Fest Philly in 2014- Art beads by: Maku Studio, Diane Hawkey, Lesley Watt , Starry Road Studio, Humble Beads, Green Girl Studios, Staci Louise Originals.

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This is a bowl of Woolywire  that I got at Bead Fest Philly 2014 by Woolywire Etc.

I like to use a lot of handmade art beads including my own lampwork when I create my mixed-media jewelry. I think of mixed-media jewelry as a collaboration of artists all in one place. Imagine wearing 3 paintings on your body. This is what jewelry is on a smaller scale of wearable art.  So let's take a look at a finished piece of jewelry and break it down.

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Here is a photo of my "Painted Batik" tapestry earrings. Did you know that 4 different artists are represented in this small piece of wearable art? In these earrings are the work of: Woolywire Etc, Staci Louise Originals, Starry Road Studio, and Third Eye Gypsy(Genea Beads). That means 4 hearts, souls, and minds each  created a beautiful work of art before it became a collaboration or artists in a finished jewelry design. Does that blow your mind? If not, it totally should! 

Below I will introduce you to each artist and show just a few photos of their process. I will link their blogs where you can see more in depth process photos just because this blog will be heavily loaded with photos already ;)

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 Here is Nellie. She is the creator behind Woolywire Etc.

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 Woolywire is created from the fleece of sheep. Next Nellie hand dyes the fibers.

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Nellie hand selects her dyed fibers to that will then get carded on her carding machine.

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 Next the wool is put on a carding machine.

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 The finished product is Woolywire which you see here. I chose to show off the gorgeous woolywire Nellie created to match my Bright Earth Wing Ding beads. 

You can see more of Nellie's creative process on her blog. 

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 Meet Karen Totten of Starry Road Studios. Karen creates clay beads, patinated metal hoops, chain, and beads.

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 I couldn't find images of Karen's metal process so I chose to show her clay beads. karen creates her own stamp designs along with other stamps to create her awesome beads. First the beads are rolled out of clay, shaped, and stamped. They are then bisque fired(which means put in the kiln as naked clay before they receive glazes).

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Here is the glazing process. You can see some of Karen's "Clay Ding" beads inspired by our "Wing Ding" beads. Here Karen is glazing the part of the clay dings she wants to add color to since the base is a black clay.

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Here you can see Karen carefully loading the kiln with her beads for their glaze firing.

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 Here are some of Karen's amazing pie beads in beautiful glazes.

For more of Karen's process photos you can check her blog out here. 

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 Meet Staci Louise Smith of Staci Louise Originals. Staci creates incredible polymer clay beads, metal beads, components, and out of this world finished jewelry. Staci' also creates mixed-media pieces of art as well.

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 Here are some of Staci's bronze clay beads before they are fired. Staci also creates her own stamps for her designs.

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Here are the bronze clay beads after their first firing.

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Here are the finished bronze clay beads with patinas and sealer. 

For more of Staci's process photos you can check her blog here.

...and finally last, but not least, your's truly...

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Genea(ME :D) of Third Eye Gypsy(Genea Beads). I create lampwork beads, lampwork components, patinated hoops, headpins, artisan jewelry, and mixed-media art.

Since you have already seen my bead making process I will just post my  patinated metals process here. To see the lampwork bead process click here. 

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I start out my process by cutting 18 gage copper wire, soldering the seams with a soldering iron, and then hammering(annealing) the hoops flat or textured to give them some more strength.

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I also created some ball headpins on my lampworking torch by cutting lengths of 18 gauge wire and then heating the ends to ball them up. The headpins along with the hoops are then put in liver of sulfur to turn them black. 

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Next the hoops are taken out of the liver of sulfur, put in a neutralizing bath, and then put through a rinse before they are laid here to dry. This is also done with the headpins you saw in the photo above.

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The hoops and headpins are then treated with 2 layers of renaissance wax to protect the layer of patina. The wax is then buffed off with a gentle cloth.

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Clear guard sealer is then used to seal the patina onto the hoops to further protect the patina and seal the metal. This process is also done on the finished jewelry for the wire-wrapped headpins and other metals that could not be coated before using them. 

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After the lampwork beads have been created and gone through their process the designing can begin. Here you can see my lampwork chakra beads with matching woolywire and recycled sari silk. 

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 Here are the finished necklaces from the photo above. I thought it was only fair to show you the finished piece for the above photo. 

I hope this blog has helped you to understand just all of the work and love that goes into art beads and the finished artisan jewelry.

Love, light, and highest vibrations,

xoxo Genea