I have had lots of enquiries about whether I am planning to do any workshops at Jewellery Maker, so I wanted to let people know that I will be doing two workshops this autumn. They are not available for booking yet, but Wendy, the workshop coordinator, is happy for me to give out the dates. She will keep a list …
On 1st June I will be reviewing and standardising the prices of all of my current tutorials, which means that some of them will be going up in price. However, in spite of the price increase I believe that my tutorials represent tremendous value for money and even after the modest rise customers will get considerably more content and more …
There is often a considerable amount of confusion about which cords or threads are suitable for beaded kumihimo, which is a shame because using the correct cord is one of the keys to maintaining the necessary tension to keep the beads in place. S-Lon and C-Lon beading cord are identical products and are perfect for most applications. However, both of …
Here are the lovely, hardworking ladies who attended my Introduction to Kumihimo workshop, which was hosted by Spoilt Rotten Beads in the pretty village of Haddenham in Cambridgeshire. My aim was to introduce the basic skills of kumihimo braiding and to add to them the tricks and tips I have learnt along the way, which ensure consistent results. I wanted …
I am a little bit behind schedule this week because of all the excitement about the DVD last week and my preparations for my second workshop at the weekend, but finally here are the mini instructions for designs shown on the Jewellery Maker show last week. I have no hand in deciding what is in the kits, beyond giving a …
It has been a very busy week or so for me because on Thursday my new DVD was launched on Jewellery Maker. It has been titled Micro Kumihimo to differentiate it from other kumihimo DVDs and it concentrates on making more delicate and intricate jewellery using kumihimo braiding techniques. The materials are finer cords and smaller gemstones, with a few …
On the top left is the original kumihimo disk, designed by Makiko Tada and manufactured by Hamanaka. On the top right is a disk available from a US website. They look pretty similar, but what is the significant difference? In the original design the numbers are located in between the slots. My guess is that this was done so that …
Kumihimo is the perfect partner to so many other jewellery making mediums. Many of the viewers of Jewellery Maker are extremely accomplished wireworkers, so I wanted to show how these skills can work brilliantly with kumihimo. With a bit of wire, some gemstones and a set of pliers a fabulous focal can be made, which can also be the starting …
Amethyst is one of the best known and best loved of all gemstones, so I was so pleased to be given a long strand of sizeable amethyst chips to work with. Added to that were some lovely pearls and some blue quartz and silver seed beeds. It was a wonderful combination and the jewellery certainly seemed to go down well …
The instructions for the second kit shown on Jewellery Maker last week are now available. Click here to find them. Showing the designs all together like this shows just how versatile metal seed beads are. The large hole size allows multiple passes through the bead with a needle and thread, opening up all sorts of different design ideas. Using the …
