Typically I complete my Art Beads pieces about three weeks after the themes are announced. I got the initial e-mail for the spring theme at the very end of March and didn't complete my piece until this past Sunday. The size for one of my bead sets was mislabeled on the Art Beads site. It took a couple weeks to get a new set of something similar in the right size. I've also been busy with custom orders (no complaints there!) and all of the moving and graduation stuff. But I finished it and am really happy with the result.
The theme for the Art Beads design partners is "What's Old is New Again." We were supposed to use any old or vintage inspired components with or without new components to create a brand new piece. I didn't have any initial idea for the theme. I started browsing the suggested site categories and came across these
patina daggers in the
glass beads category. I'm sure that it's no surprise that I was immediately drawn to them. I've been eying some similar ones in Shannon's shop for a while, but hadn't bought any yet. This was the perfect opportunity to use them. The whole set with orange, lime, turquoise, and purple reminded me of the 70's, which fit perfectly for this theme, so I decided to go with it.
Once I was set on the patinas, I hunted through my own bead stash for cube and seed beads in coordinating colors. I supplied all of these myself, although three of the cube bead sets were ones that I'd purchased from Art Beads on my own. You can see my sneak peak post about this
here. I filled in the patina daggers with orange, lime, and transparent green daggers. I love the dagger beads on Art Beads, but as I've posted about here before, it's cheaper to buy them in bulk elsewhere. Usually I get a few unusual designs from Art Beads and fill them in with bulk solid colors.
This is the first dagger bracelet that I've made with side fringe. I used coordinating orange and lime
pressed Czech glass beads, along with the seed beads, with the same technique that I use for my other skinny fringed/embellished bracelets. If you want links for the specific Czech glass that I used in this piece, let me know.
Art Beads has several awesome triangle clasps in their
clasp category. I choose this one because it was vintage inspired and has the circles on it, which mirror the ones on the patinas. Normally I would have used a button from my own collection, but we need two product categories for our pieces, so this was a perfect way to make that happen.
I decided to name the piece after
That '70s Show. I thought that this would be appropriate as I grew up in the 80's and got my inspiration for this retro color combination from my own generation's pop culture.
I love the way the colors came together in this piece. I also love the side fringe. I think that the size and shape of the beads that I chose worked really well as a little border. I may experiment with similar fringe in the future.
It's available
here. I collected some new green daggers in the process of making this bracelet so I'm planning an all green dagger bracelet in the future. That's the only dagger piece that I have in the works right now, but as always I'm open to other suggestions.
Disclosure - I received my ArtBead's products free of charge through their blogging program. I am honestly reviewing their products and have not been paid for my endorsement as it pertains to the products I received.
