There has never been a time when I wasn't enchanted by beads. Big ones, little ones, shiny beads, dull beads, sparkling faceted beads... there's just something about them that's addicting. One day near the turn of the millennium (I have ALWAYS wanted to say that!), I saw a picture of an antique beaded flower. "That's quite possibly the coolest thing I have ever seen," I told myself.
Myself agreed.
"I can't possibly kill those," I thought to myself.
"Damn skippy," myself thought back.

Thus began the hunt for MORE INFORMATION about this nearly lost art, which at the time was pretty scarce. So I did what anyone would do (sold off a bunch of the husband's stuff while he wasn't looking & bought beads) and dug in to find out what I could. It became in obsession. Little bits of info here and there about these wonderful, long lasting beaded flower sculptures were hidden among just about everything I never knew I wanted to know about beads. It turns out that many of the techniques to creating them date back centuries. There was a brief revival in popularity in the '60s, and luckily for me there was another, longer resurgence shortly after I began my search.

I make my flowers by stringing tiny glass beads onto wire and bending them into shape. My creations take time to make (The fern took nearly 4 months to complete and gave me an aversion to green that took almost a year to overcome), but the end results are worth it! I use various old techniques from around the world in addition to a few techniques I developed along the way out of necessity. Because I come from a long line of artists and craftsmen, my interests are widely varied but I always come back to my flowers. The possibilities are endless, and it's so much fun hunting down unique colors and finishes for my projects, because really what it all comes down to is... it's all about the beads.