First bead embroidery!

I've been busy with all sorts of things lately: the opera companies, sewing a new wardrobe for the audition tour this fall, getting the house in order: but the most fun I've been having is exploring more techniques of bead weaving.

I've long wanted to try my hand at bead embroidery, and I finally made the time this week. Here's my first piece.

The focal point is a large faceted crystal agate cabochon, I didn't like it very much when it arrived in the post (I had ordered it through eBay) but I love it now it's in its setting. The secondary focal point is a resin cab I had lying around.

The bezels are 11/0 and 15/0 seed beads in brass and black. The piece is decorated with crystals, fire polished stones, various kinds of seed beads and some pieces of carnelian. The rope is simply two lengths of spiral stitched seed beads in brown, brass and bright orange. The drops are crystal.

I did the work on  Nicole's BeadBacking -- wonderful stuff to work on and it comes in a pretty extensive range of colours. I can really recommend it -- I bought the sample pack of 4" x 3" pieces of all 14 colours and it was easy to find the right colour for this piece. (Sadly, I see that as of today Nicole seems to be away for a family emergency. I hope all goes well for her).

It was a great learning experience for me, and I get a pretty new piece that accents my new wardrobe!