Every once in a while, a design inspiration comes to me like a lightening bolt making contact with a solid object! It is a rare occurrence, but welcome all the same. Since I travel a lot, I have a tremendous amount of time that is spent on airplanes. I actually like that time as I usually bead or play with designing in my sketchbook. Recently, I was on a flight, heading for home, skimming through an airline magazine and came across an article about a cake shop in Maryland. Now, I don’t usually get inspired to design looking at cakes, but this shop owner was making magic in each and every confection! He was creating cakes that moved, talked, and most importantly to me, were incredibly beautiful. One series of cakes were decorated in a paisley theme with intricate, lacey and inviting lines. These images made me want to design a new piece, not later, but now, so the rest of the flight was taken over by the creative process.

See additional color palette & photo details of necklace...

Naming a new design mostly happens during the process of creating. Since almost all of my designs are based on historical perspective, I tend to know what path I wish to take, as in a time period or style. Designing around cake images is definitely a new path for me! Amazingly, the word, “Intermezzo” kept coming to mind long before the design actually started taking shape. Generally, this term means a composition that fits between another musical, or other dramatic entities, such as acts of a play or movements of a larger musical work. For me, I guess it means that Intermezzo Necklace can stand on its own, as a design, that was created between the regular progression of my body of artwork. Sort of like a lovely interlude or intermission that has its own voice.

Intermezzo Necklace uses beautiful, natural and lab-grown, faceted gemstones and high quality CZ’s, along with fine metal mountings as part of the design. This process is new to me and very elegant. The bail of the pendant is created in dimensional Lattice Weave then embellished at the top and along the edges. Hanging from the bail is a pendant made with Peyote Stitch, Netting and embellishing techniques. All of these techniques are used to capture a series of faceted gemstones and CZ’s for an elegantly shaped pendant.

The pendant is strung onto a strand of pearls, interspersed with beaded rings of dimensional Lattice Weave that are embellished. Some of the rings are set with pearls and gemstones or CZ’s. The necklace ends with two beaded gemstone or CZ buttons and a shaped loop closure. The closure connector mimics the design of the beaded rings plus two Peyote stitch loops made using a technique I call “split circle”, that divides one tube of Peyote into two and allows each to hook around a button.

This is a 2-day workshop.
Skill level: This workshop is for the advanced level beader. The student must be familiar with Peyote Stitch and Netting. Lattice Weave will be taught in class but understanding Right Angle Weave would be helpful.

Photos this page: Mark Rutledge