TBS - November meeting

It's the second Wednesday of the month, which means it's the November meeting of the Toronto Bead Society tonight.  The guest speaker is Maria Rypan (Rypan Designs), who'll be giving a presentation called, "Embellishing Your World: Beading and Surface Designs."  (I hope Maria doesn't mind that I've copied this picture of her from her website.)

The TBS website describes Maria's talk as follows:

"“Embellishing Your World: Beading & Surface Designs” is about transforming the mundane into beautiful with an array of techniques and design ideas. Be inspired to embellish a few things once you see how people in different parts of the world meet the challenge to create beauty with materials on hand. Breathtaking photos of decorated objects and their stories will motivate you to transform a few of your own.

There will be many incredible artifacts representing the First Nations people, Pashtun tribes, Zulu chiefs, Indonesian deity, Ukrainian artisans, school kids and a former dissident, US crafters and Canadian bead artists! See beaded flowers, ‘pysanky’ eggs and ornaments. Visually "meet" some of these talented people with their folk art.

The title page and first four slides feature fascinating beaded objects from our own Naomi Smith’s Collection of First Nations Beadwork. Here’s a chance to learn more about them as they’re projected onto the screen. Nothing beats seeing the beadwork displays up close for maximum appreciation!

Come and be inspired to embellish your own world."

Do we bead artists need any encouragement to embellish? I don't think so!! But I'm sure Maria's presentation will be very entertaining - see you there.

Getting Published

The October meeting of the Toronto Bead Society featured a panel discussing the topic of "Selling Your Designs for Publication". The panel consisted of Maria Rypan (http://www.rypandesigns.com/), Marilyn Gardiner (http://www.marilyngardiner.com/) and Carla Canonico, the editor of Needle Pulling Thread magazine (http://www.aneedlepullingthread.com/). (BTW, I hadn't read this magazine before but I won a copy at the meeting and quite enjoyed it. Mostly focused on needlework and quilting - the photos are beautiful - but they do have a couple of beading designs as well.)

Maria had her first design published in Bead & Button magazine in 2003 and has been featured in several publications since then. She is currently appearing in the October/November 2009 issue of Beadwork magazine with a design call "scythian gold" (must be a typo, should be "Cynthia's Gold", don't you think?!!! Actually, "the name relates to one of the original habitants of the Ukraine, the Scythians, and draws inspiration from troves of ancient gold jewelry excavated in the country's royal burial mounds", according to the write up.) Her comments on the panel were very informative from a designer's perspective.

Carla, as an actual editor of a magazine, gave pointers from the perspective of the people who receive submissions from artists and consider them for inclusion in their magazine.

Marilyn is a jewellery designer and teacher who has done quite a bit of self-publication, mostly of her own patterns and designs.

It was an interesting discussion covering a variety of topics, from the importance of good photographs to send with your submissions to the need to be multi-tasking (teaching, designing, operating a website, blogging) and networking all the time in order to keep your product (i.e., you) in the public eye to the necessity of creating instructions that are easy to follow. It was interesting to hear that your design doesn't have to be complicated to be chosen but it does need to be unique. It is very important to read the submission guidelines for each magazine (often found on their website) but often, it just boils down to the fact that you happen to submit something at a certain point in time that matches the criteria of what the editors are looking for at that time.

Some of the key tips were: don't submit the same piece to more than one magazine at a time, don't be discouraged if your piece isn't accepted (it doesn't mean it's not fabulous, it's just not what they need right then), submit work that is different, unique, innovative and well put together, play with designs and always, make pieces you truly believe in instead of just something you think will "sell".

Speaking of being published, I am incredibly excited to advise that I am featured in the latest issue (Winter 2010) of Bead Unique magazine. A photo of yours truly making glass beads at the torch (taken by Dwyn Tomlinson) appears on page 41 of the magazine, as part of an article written by Jennifer Keil about one of my favourite beading stores, Beadfx in Toronto, as the topic of their regular column, "I Could Just Live Here!". I look a bit like a bug with my protective didymium glasses but as Marg Yamanaka, owner of Beadfx, describes it, I am grinning like a cheshire cat, obviously happy to be making beads!!

As far as being published in a beading magazine, hey, a girl's got to start somewhere!! :)

Ukrainian Beading

At the January meeting of the Toronto Bead Society, Maria Rypan treated us to a slide show and discussion of contemporary beadwork in the Ukraine. Her talk was based on her recent travels there and the artists she has met while visiting. I was quite interested to learn that beading is mostly found in the western part of the country and doesn't form part of the traditions for the eastern areas. It was no surprise to hear that the Soviet regime discouraged the bead artists from using certain colours, such as those for their national flag, in their designs and she showed us an example of how one artist had discreetly placed the banned colours in their work. She also showed us pictures of incredibly elaborate beaded necklaces made by the men and women she had met, many of whom sell their work at outdoor markets. I was quite impressed by the volume of pieces they had on hand in their stalls, dozens of pieces representing literally hundreds of hours of work. Another traditional form of beadwork for this country is beaded eggs, made using either wooden forms or actual eggs that have been emptied before being decorated - can you imagine working with something so fragile as the base for your beadwork? As well as the slide show photos, Maria also brought along examples of the jewellery, eggs and clothing she has picked up on her travels to include in her personal collection. The beaded clothing worn for holidays and ceremonial occasions was especially interesting to see and touch - as a result of the amount of beadwork added to fabric, the pieces are quite heavy. All in all, it was a very interesting presentation, thanks Maria!

You can check out Maria's website at http://www.rypandesigns.com/

Creating Snowflakes

Today I took a class at Bead Junction to learn how to make snowflakes. It was taught by the amazing Maria Rypan of Rypan Designs (http://www.rypandesigns.com/), who is well known for her beadweaving and especially her expertise in Ukrainian-style beadwork.


The snowflakes were very easy to make and quite beautiful when finished. Maria sells kits in three different sizes (small, medium and large). They are made using something called Soft Touch, a relatively new product of beading wire (or maybe just new to me!) available from both Beadalon and Soft Flex, that is thin like thread but strong like wire. It's very soft and flexible and you can even tie knots in it! You actually thread it onto a needle, which makes it very easy to work with, especially when making these snowflakes.


The pattern is very simple, a combination of overlapping "v's" with Swarovski crystals on the tips. It also folds up into a neat crown-like shape when not laid flat. (notice how the AB cut of the crystal reflects the light as a colour in the photo? cool!)