New Ideas for Netted Beadwork

Bead Net
New Ideas for Netted Beadwork
Heather Kingsley-Heath
:-:)&33/7
Copyright © Rainbow Disks Limited 2007
:MZIFSSOWERMQTVMRXSJRainbow Disks Ltd
www.ZMZIFSSOW.com
0RHIR:EPI,
,S[IPPRoad,
)\IXIV
)<4 0*
9/
First published in the UK in 2007:MZIFSSOWIHMXMSR
Text, projects and photographs © Heather Kingsley-Heath 2007
The Author:
Heather
Kingsley-Heath
Heather is a designer, teacher,
author, and owner of
The Useful Booklet Company.
Her work appears frequently
in UK magazines.
Heather is constantly
researching crafts in many
cultures, and her work includes
advising indigenous people on
how to create craft goods that
can sustain a meaningful income.
For a list of Heather’s books,
see page 62
To see more of Heather’s
work and the Useful Booklet
Company, go to Heatherworks
at:
www.heatherworks.co.uk
Heather Kingsley-Heath has asserted her right to be indentified as author
of this work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in
a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic or
mechanical, by photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior permission in
writing from the publisher.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN 978-1-906314--
Copying this disk for anything other than your own use is theft. Making pirate copies
deprives people of rightful income from their hard work.
Heather Kingsley-Heath holds copyright to all designs in this book; they may be made
up for personal use only. It is illegal to sell jewellery made from these designs.
:-:)&33/7
www.ZMZIFSSOW.com
HOW TO USE YOUR INTERACTIVE PDF
Browse through this book using the pdf bookmarks and page
tabs on the left-hand side – they will take you quickly to the
chapter, project or page you need.
Use the pdf zoom tool to zoom in on close-up details in photographs, and see
the details greatly enlarged. TIP: Click on the zoom tool and drag a box around
the area you want to enlarge.
When you have chosen your first project, print out its pages for easy and
portable reference.
Use links to suppliers to go directly to their web pages.
2
Contents
Secti on 1
S e c t i on 3
Se c t i on 5
The story &
preparation
Increase net &
fastenings
Tube bangles
5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 23 Introduction
24 Swelly belly
26 Swelly belly variations
27 Tube train lariat
28 Tube train red
29 Tube train variations
30 Clasps: button and
loop
31 Clasps: beaded toggle
32 Clasps: beaded button
Introduction
Spread the net
The story of net
The variations of net
Tools
Beads
Choosing beads
Creative journey
Basic information
Secti on 2
Bead tubes &
beaded beads
14 Introduction
15 Five-bead net tube
16 Adding pattern lariat
17 Slinky lariat
18 Changing scale lariat
19 Netted bead
20 Lateral embellished
bead
21 Vertical embellished
bead
22 Picot embellished bead
Section 4
Flat netting
33 Introduction
34 Ring
35 Ring bangle
36 Expanda bangle
37 Expanda bangle
variations
38 Netball bead
39 Spiky embellishment
40 Netball variations
3
41 42 43 44 46 47 48 Introduction
Gild the lily
Gild the lily variations
The bangle
Sea urchin bangle
Sea urchin embellished
Sea urchin variations
Se c t i on 6
Hollow net
49 Introduction
50 Baroque plain
52 Baroque more
54 Baroque bead:
donut, round
55 Baroque bead:
mini round, melon
gallery
56 Gallery
58 Sketchbook gallery
60 Last word
61 About Africa and me
62 Suppliers/
Useful Information
Picot embellished bead
Ingredients
10g size 11˚ seed beads in 3
colours that match or contrast
•
size 10 needle
beading thread
•
extra beads, e.g. size
9˚, 8˚ or 6˚, or shaped beads
(optional)
To add more texture and create a
different type of embellishment, you
will need to know how to form
picots. These can either be added
laterally or vertically in just the same way
as the other bead embellishment, but there is just one extra step.
To form a picot
Bring the needle through an intersection
bead and pick up four seed beads.
Pass the needle back through the third
seed bead. Then pick up two more
seed beads and pass through the next
intersection bead.
To tighten a picot, hold the bead at the
tip, pull the thread, then let go of the tip.
This bead will then sit back down and
‘lock’ the thread in place.
Variations
have one (pick
• Pupicotsthreecan beads
to start),
two (pick up four beads), or
three (pick up five beads)
bead ‘legs’. When you have
passed through a bead to
form the tip, pick up the corresponding number (one, two
or three) beads to form the
second leg.
a larger bead for the bead
•Uyouse pass
through twice.
se beads in a colour
•Usequence
within your picot.
22
Section
3
Increase net
and fastenings
Now to start changing the shape
B
y now you will be comfortable with the basics of netting,
and hopefully getting used to how much thread tension
you need to apply to form happy beaded tubes.
Section Three shows you how to add scale to your
netted tube, which is the first step in altering your netting in
order to start shaping it.
The most straightforward way to change the shape of
your netted tube is to increase the number of beads in a set.
By altering the set sizes, you can create bulges. By increasing
the number of beads in your sets as you work, the tube will
become fatter. If you reduce the number, it will shrink back to
the original diameter again.
You can also start layering your netted tubes one on top
of the other, which is a great opportunity to break out all
those colours and start playing with them.
I have included some finishing techniques here too.
There is no escaping the fact that necklaces and bracelets
often need a clasp. Call me a purist if you like, but I prefer
closures that are made of beads. There are hundreds of
metal clasps available and in the right circumstances they can
look fabulous with beadwork, but all too often a metal clasp
just looks out of place. I use a beaded tube as a toggle or a
beaded disc, and when I can find them, the easiest clasp in the
world to attach is a gorgeous button in just the right material
to match your beads.
If you are a fan of metal clasps, use and enjoy them. If you
like the metal versions of toggle and ring clasps, you will need
to add a stalk of beads behind the toggle, otherwise there
may not be room for it to lie at an angle in order to pass
through the ring section. Thread on a few beads, then add the
bar end of the clasp, thread back through the beads and into
your beadwork.
It helps to repeat the process through all the beads again
to add strength, as the clasp is the part of your design that
will get handled the most.
23
Section
4
Flat netting
Flat netting can be rounded too
N
ow you should be really comfortable with netted tubes
and thread tension. Section Four is a complete change
in pace and moves away from tube-constructed netting to
explore flat netting. To get you used to making flat pieces and
zipping them up, we start with a cute beaded ring. These are
great fun to make and use up those small amounts of spare
beads that are never quite enough for a full project.
Flat netting may not appear to lend itself to shaping, but
it illustrates one more step in the quest for self-supporting
netted structures as we begin to explore the physics of
structure. Thread tension comes into play as always, but this
time it is assisted by bead size. Be amazed by your first piece
of stretchy net, and also by netted beadwork that begins to
mimic the properties of that original piece of plastic packaging
I worked with.
We then apply these ideas to netting in the round. In
Section Two you worked on surface embellishment and used it
for decoration. Within the following projects it is used to add
surface tension, helping to pull your flat netting into a rounded
shape that will happily stay rounded on its own.
Be prepared to start mixing it up with bead sizes and to
play with the scale and texture of your embellishment.
We also take a look at some alternatives to netted tubes
as a base for your work, with simple wire work and some
colourful textiles to get your ideas flowing.
33
Section
5
Tube bangles
Now get seriously into shaping
N
ow we get back into structure again, taking tubular
beadwork from Section Two, zipping it up as you did with
the flat netting in Section Four and embellishing it as you have
been discovering all the way through the sections. The principles
of physics that you found in Section Four apply here too. By
adding beads of different sizes, you can completely alter the
tension within your work,
enabling it to hold shape.
The adventure continues
with the application of
that other principle – using
different set sizes within a
piece. If you remember way
back at the start, I had been
playing with a piece of plastic
netting that showed me that
not all apertures in the net
need be the same.
My exploration of these techniques began with a curiosity
about that plastic netting, and how it could be translated into
beadwork with nothing more than a good technique, some
beads and regular beading thread. Section Five shows how, in
the end, it all came together. Throughout I have emphasized that
thread tension is key to the success of netting techniques, that
you should be able to keep and hold tension in your thread as
you work and feel the beads click into place.
The use of varying bead sizes can assist by adding tension
within the work, based on their increased diameter and the
journey the thread makes within the beads. Applying new
layers of beadwork has also been a useful tool to help netting
hold its shape.
Hopefully, you are still enjoying the journey and ready to set
off on the next stage.
41
Section
6
Hollow net
The final stage of gorgeously rounded netting
S
o, we nearly have self-supporting, empty net – nearly,
because so far we have relied on a little help from surface
embellishment to keep things afloat. The Sea Urchin bangle (see
pages 46–48) works on its own without the additional spikes, but
it is still a tube.
For the last step in the process of creating empty netted
beadwork, we go right back to the beaded tube again, but this
time we will be changing the number of sets rather than the size
of the sets. Try it within a tube first until you get the principle,
then spread your wings and create beaded beads that really will
stand up on their own, as long as you have that thread tension
sorted.
Now it all comes together from those original examinations
of beadwork from around the world. Set sizes, already partially
explored, and set numbers within rounds all come together
to create near spherical netting that really satisfies my original
empty-net syndrome.
The final designs rely on nothing but the structure of the
beadwork to hold their shape. No more embellished surfaces or
changes in bead sizes; now it is just netting, executed with good
thread tension, and the principles at work when the set sizes are
altered.
The designs in this section are given as patterns for you to
follow, with specific colour combinations and numbers of rounds.
Feel free to create your own combinations; these are simply in
place to enable you to try the technique first.
Once you have tried the basic principle at work, anchoring
your newly dimensional expanded sections to a netted tube, you
can move on rapidly to create netted beads that stand alone. In
truth, no hollow beadwork will withstand too much pressure,
but these techniques result in hollow beads that should happily
stand up to daily wear and tear. If you should happen to sit on
them by accident, they will easily pop back into shape with a little
encouragement.
49