Outwest

No...this post is not about the location Outwest...it's about Julie, the artist behind OUTWEST or Indian Creek Art Glass.

I have posted about her beads in the past, but today, my mail carrier actually delivered MY mail (instead of somebody else's mail....story for another time) and I received gorgeous beads I ordered from Julie last week. 

I am fairly new to using lampwork glass disc beads, but I ordered some of her chunky disc beads and wanted to "kick it up a notch" and do something just a little different for me.  

First up is this lovely, pale lavender set of beads.  Oh my, but this is one of my mother's favorite colors!  Luckily, I have already made her at least 10 pair of purple earrings.....

Aren't these soft, pale colors gorgeous!  I double wrapped and messy wrapped at the same time!  Let me tell you, it is not easy to messy wrap, at least for me!  These earrings are also small - only 1 1/2" in length - I really like this style.

Next up is this gorgeous shade of pale green.

Is anyone else craving a life saver?  I mean, this is a really luscious color people!

The last pair I made today are from a pale aqua, with beautiful striations of pale green.  I actually made this pair first and I will not tell you how much silver went right into my "silver recycle cup"!  I kept on changing the design until I finally came up with one I liked!

Look at those gorgeous colors below!  Swoon!! I banged out some bead caps with silver sheet - I made the texture by using my riveting hammer - it always reminds me of tree bark - love it!

I VERY CAREFULLY forged the ends of the 16 gauge silver to create a paddle shape on each side to capture the bead.  I only use butane and mapp gas torches in my studio (I have not graduated to the Big Girl torches yet, so my flame would be too big and too hot to ball up the wire on the ends - it would crack the glass.  I learned that one the hard way a long time ago!)   Anyway, this was my solution to create a type of pendulum effect for the earrings. 

This has to be the hardest pair of earrings to photograph!  They are on the long side - just under 2 1/2", and they do not lay flat!  So, I had to resort to including my chunky fingers in this picture so that one could see how they would hang when worn:

I had a good 3 hours in the studio today - it is located in my unfinished basement where I can make as big a mess as I want.  Not to mention, it's about 10 degrees cooler down there, which I love during this nasty heat wave we are going through right now.

Julie if you are reading this blog post, I am truly, truly in awe of your talent and I thank you for creating such beautiful beads! 

Thanks for stopping by today!  

Patti