Wiwat Kamolpornwijit started his show season with a twist in Florida last weekend. Dots are a hot item and Wiwat gives his a twist that plays with geometry.
He backs dotted veneers with silver clay that he cuts into circles. Sliced across the middle, half the circle heads east and the other flips west as they are mounted on round silver links.
Sometimes we like the unexpected.
“It has to be a long time ago when we had such a winter with low temperature and so much snow. Of course, I went out for frosty photos and frosty hands and feet,” says Germany’s Meike Lucia Friemel (MeikeLucia) who is both a metalworker and polymer artist.
“I like the difference between “slow” metalwork and “fast” clay work,” she says. Polymer gives her the possibility of neverending color.
See how Meike brought the wintery weather into these bangles. They may make you shiver here on Facebook and Flickr.
Czech Republic’s Ivana Svobodová makes a game of collecting all her thin, tiny scraps and then sitting down for a game of assemblage. Nothing goes to waste as she creates a series of puzzled brooches.
The face parts mixed in with all the patterns add an element of surprise and mystery.
You don’t need to speak a word of Russian to understand Juliya Laukhina’s pod tutorials that she offers free on her Instagram. Just watch closely.
She makes creating this black and white one look oh so seductively easy and fast.
Juliya has covered wonderfully colored bead bases with cane slices for years. Now she’s moved to larger pod shapes.
It’s generous of her to share their construction with us to start the week right.
Greece’s Katerina Strouggari (@mepolymeraki) zigs and zags her polymer earrings, tucking in balls of clay for an imitative soutache design.
She starts with one long strip of black and white, adding alternating colors of balls between each turn.
Soutache is the narrow braid embroidery associated with military and band uniforms.
See how she creates the same effect on pendants on Facebook
We thought we’d seen black and white manipulated and stretched and combined in every way possible. Then UK’s Carol Blackburn took another look and came up with this Barcode necklace.
It’s made of her hollow tetra beads, dimensional shapes that remind me of small cream containers and fancy tea bags.
So not only are the striped patterns confounding, but the shapes add another layer of difficulty. The most magical thing is that her methods are actually elegantly simple. Here’s hoping she adds this to her upcoming classes.
Russia’s Tanya Mayorova tops her crisp black and white patterns with highlights of gold that give this cuff, earrings, and necklace added graphic punch.
Big holed tube beads and a fat cord add the right touch for the bold graphics. Go bold, go big.
Boston’s Betsy Baker makes her Manhattan debut June 8 & 9 at the Craft New York show.
Merely visiting her site makes you feel much more chic and sophisticated. Betsy limits her palette to a monochromatic mix set against grunge textures. Often there’s a hidden bit of silver and gold sparkle that appears like buried treasure.
Betsy branched out from her Boston market to the ACC shows and now she’s taking on New York. Betsy thinks big! If you want to see what that looks like, read her site and Instagram.
Caner Carola Greiser (polymerclayshed) from Texas starts our week with a black and white background cane. Carola made the cane specifically to frame her moose cane.
But who wouldn’t welcome the sketchy dashes and lines of this composition to enhance a larger design? It has the look of a Norwegian knitting pattern.
Carola uses her designs to cover crochet hooks, card cases, pens, and other small items that you can see on Instagram and Etsy.
