Working With Dark Colors in Boro Lampwork Beads

My favorite beads are bright and colorful.  I get my design inspiration from the beads themselves — regardless of whether they’re gemstones and wood in fun colors and textures ….

Or expressive borosilicate glass beads with their characteristic nebula centers….

But sometimes I end up with beads that are darker than I thought they would be, and working with them presents a challenge.  How to make the most of these beads?

Sometimes boro beads have the nebula effect I love, and finding colors to accent them is a snap.  However, some have to be held closer to the eye to appreciate them.  A photograph can show their beauty, but on the table or on a display at a craft show, the colors can look muddy or muted.

In these cases, I try to pull out the light in the beads, to awaken the fire  I know is caught inside.  For this blue bracelet, I played with the green and light blue caught inside the navy blue and burgundy.  I immediately lightened up the entire bracelet visually by wire-linking it to large silver rings instead of stringing it.  I also added one large silver bead as an asymmetric note to break up the strand of blue lampwork.

A photograph flooded with plenty of natural light and a heavy dose of PhotoShop made the bead colors come out even more, but you can see how the glass beads would appear quite dark on a show table or in the hand.  Presented with glittering blue crystal and pale green amazonite charms for movement and silver for more brightness, this piece sold immediately at my last show.

The next set of beads presented a similar problem — the pink was beautiful, but the colors were opaque, with virtually no definition or color striations.  How to make the most of them?

Although the bracelet took a long time to complete, it only took two elements to make it work — a stunning clasp and a ton of pale pink pearls.  I made what felt like a billion small pearl dangles to cluster up and nestle against each of the deep berry-pink glass, added a bit of silver to cap each boro lampwork bead, and added that artful clasp.  Done and done!

Both of those sets of lampwork beads had been languishing at the back of my bead cabinet for a couple of years.  I’d pull them out, and then put them back.  The colors weren’t giving me anything to work with, and my creativity wasn’t helping me.  But I finally decided enough was enough, and I wasn’t getting up from my work bench until those two sets had been transformed.

So I challenge you to do the same.  Go find a set of beads that have been bothering you for some reason.  Sit with them for a while.  And then make something beautiful.

Lori Anderson is a full-time jewelry designer who sells her work online at www.lorianderson.net as well as at craft shows in the Mid-Atlantic.  She also blogs at www.prettythingsblog.com.  She resides in Easton, MD.