Right Angle Weave

I took a class at Bead Junction today on the beading stitch known as Right Angle Weave or RAW for short. The class was taught by the very patient Patricia Huff. I say "patient" because there were 3 of us and at any given point, none of us seemed to be at the same stage in the process but that didn't seem to matter to her. Thanks, Patricia!

RAW is one of the main beading stitches that I was not yet familiar with. We started out with bugles so we could clearly see the right angles being formed. Kate McKinnon has a great way of explaining this process, as if the four sides are the ceiling, floor and two walls of a room and you're making an apartment building (or for those of us in Toronto, yet another condo development!).

Then we switched to size 8/0 seed beads in two contrasting colours. As you can see from this photo, I definitely have the hang of it in my piece on the left but compared to Patricia's on the right, which is much straighter and uniform looking, I need a little work on the tension of my thread, in order to make the beads line up the way they are supposed to. But I like the finished effect either way!

I'll need a bit more practice but when I'm ready, I'm looking forward to making Kate's Groovy Cuff kit and some of the designs in Marcia DeCoster's Beaded Opulence book.

Okay, gotta go practice!