Studio Saturday

artifact beads

In 2007 I went out to my studio and made some electroformed beads. My very first lampworking teacher was Kate Fowle. In 1998 I sat in her studio and made some horrifically lopsided glass beads. But I learned so much - about glass bead making and myself. Perusing all of Kate’s perfect beads I became intrigued with her beads that were electroformed with copper. But I didn’t dare think about trying that technique - in fact it took me 8 years before I even attempted it. I went home, set up my garage studio and concentrated on perfecting making glass beads in the flame.

electroformed beads by Kate Fowle

But those electroformed beads haunted me. In 2007 I bought the needed equipment and after a few weeks learned the technique and made quite a few electroformed beads. Metal and glass - it was my calling.

Around the same time in the late 1990’s Rio Grande - a jewelry supply company - introduced a material from Japan called PMC (precious metal clay). It was reclaimed silver suspended in a binder that looked like modeling clay. Burning away the binder would leave you with sintered fine silver. So, you could mold it and form it and bake it and you would be left with a fine silver object. The initial thinking was to use it as a silversmith would use sheet metal for fabrication.

So, I decided I needed to explore this material too. As with anything new there was a learning curve and years of experimentation. So much fun. I made my share of rings. But it was a medium that was ridiculed by trained silversmiths; but I knew there was a place for this medium in my work - just not at the moment.

Then in 2008 after many metal clay rings and a bowl full of electroformed glass beads, I decided that metal clay should adorn the glass, but I didn’t know how. And google didn’t know either.

There were lots of obstacles. In order to have the metal clay adhere to the glass and become silver you had to bake it. And that means temps of 1600 degrees F. At that temp the glass would slump and if you started with a bead, you would lose the hole. Or the glass would devitrify. Or the class would distort. But I persisted and perfected a technique to add the metal clay to the glass bead and still have a bead. That article was published in Glassline Magazine in the June July 2009 issue Volume 23, No 1. Later the article was picked up by a Japanese glass magazine because metal clay originated in Japan by the Mitsubishi Co.

I called these beads Caged Artifact Beads. I can’t tell you how many I sold at the Bead and Button Shows. This image was the first successful caged bead I made and is the bead I still wear today on a stainless-steel neck ring.

But these caged beads have also adorned many necklaces.

I got fancy and incorporated gemstones.

And in 2010 a glass bead enhanced with PMC made the cover of the International Society of Glass Beadmakers journal. It was the bead chosen to represent the annual meeting or “Gathering” of glass artists.

So, metal clay on glass turned out to be a great project. And the byline to my business became, Creating the desert in glass and metal

I am adding a paywall here and adding a short story that I wrote “The Spark that Lit the Way Back”.

Thanks for being here

Louise x