Thursday 14 June and Friday 15 June 2012

Beyond the Beginnings: Striving for Perfection - 2 days

This 2-day class is aimed at beadmakers who want a solid base from which they will be able any kind of bead-design they can envision.

What does this class teach?
Pretty much all of the things in "Passing The Flame", and a bunch of new stuff as well:

• how to make a round bead in no time
• dot-application and designing with dots
• dot-manipulation like poking, twisting, silver-lined dots
• And then of course (the one thing that most students want to learn from me): stringer control

We will make a variety of twisties and striped cane, encased goldstone stringer, use of dichroic - and then we'll encase, of course. The type of beads we'll work on as the "graduation" pieces depend on the desire of the students, we either make florals, or tidepool/fossil beads, or something else altogher.

It is suitable for:

• beginners (as long as they have basic familiarity with lighting the torch, dipping mandrels and safety precautions)
• to advanced beadmakers, who feel that they could learn more about controlling the glass to do with they want it to do

The following things will be covered:
Shaping beads, dot application and manipulation, pulling stringer and stringer control, twisties and cane, encasing, and anything we have time left to do.