Newest Glass Obsession

My latest obsession is webbing with Terra2. Each bead comes out completely different from the last so it's never boring. Of course that means I can't reproduce a bead either but that's pretty much how it goes with silver glass anyway.

New Olympia Rain

For those of you that are storming, I thought you might like to see what the new version of Olympia Rain can also do. The new version of OR tends to start turning translucent when worked in the flame for a period of time. It can also go opaque when worked longer. You can stop this from happening by covering it with clear like I do in the Taking Reduction Glass by Storm Tutorial. The layer of clear acts as an insulater. But you can also take that little quirk and use it to your advantage. These two sets use lightly stormed OR and they were not topped with clear. I left the OR slightly raised. The top set is lightly stormed OR over ASK Silver Cinnamon and the bottom set is lightly stormed OR over reduced Nyx. The time it takes to add the Dark Ivory accent dots is just enough time to let the OR turn translucent. And the beads were worked in a neutral flame the entire time....except of course when I reduced the Nyx. The OR also color shifts and has a shimmery sheen to it which doesn't show well in photos. These dots have a very opalesque look to them that I really love. Of course there is no storm showing, but lightly storming the OR just helps to start the shift to translucency.

Dots

I've been kind of obsessed with making intricate dot beads lately. Unfortunately it's made me admit that my vision has drastically changed lately. I'm going to give the stick on magnifiers a try first because it seems that I'm only having a problem with close work. It pretty much sucks.

This set Sea Baubles is up on eBay right now. The dots are just Olympia Rain over Triton...no clear topping. I love how Triton heavily fumes dark ivory and then the addition of Olympia Rain even takes it a step further so the ivory dot bases are a deep brown. I'm just not sure how well dot beads are sought after by jewelry artists no matter how cool I think they are.

Olympia Rain

These Firefly beads up on eBay were made with a new version of Olympia Rain. I did a lot of comparison beads for Jed using the original OR and this new version and I like the new version encased better. The nuggets are lightly reduced and encased and the discs are heavily reduced and encased.

Sea Trinkets

I hadn't sat down at the torch to make any bead sets in quite some time. I got a custom order for a couple from one of my special customers and I got in that set "mode". So I did this additional set which is in my Etsy store. This is Silver Cinnamon, Silver Rattan, Dark Ivory, Nyx and Olympia Rain. A favorite color combination of mine.