These are the first 'proper' beads I've made this year and I am SO pleased with them.For almost four years (on and off) I've been trying to create a cherry blossom design on beads but I couldn't quite work out the best way to do it. This week I realised that I had been making things way more complicated than they needed to be. I've tried frit, encasing, enamelled stringers and more before but the effect always ended up muddy and blurred. I was aiming for a crisp, stylised but recognisable-as-cherry-blossom design and I've finally cracked it!
I wanted to give the beads a Japanese feel so I've used the traditional 'tombodama' olive-shaped bead that Japanese lampworkers favour and I've also given the beads the name 'Sakura' which is Japanese for, you guessed it, cherry blossom.I'm chuffed to bits with them and I hope you like them too.
These focals will be for sale on my website at 8.30 pm (UK time) tomorrow night.
