Czech Beads

There have been a lot of new shapes of Czech glass beads made in the last few years. Many are made by Preciosa. They have some beautiful examples using their beads on their website. There are also several designers who make wonderful things with them. ElllaD2 has beautiful jewelry designs. Ivona Suchmannova has many lovely things for inspiration including some terrific snowflakes made with spike beads.

I am not very good at looking at a design and figuring it out. My 1st attempt used the biggest (about 20mm) spikes. I made a Superduo center and then did herringbone stitch up from the gaps between them with  size 8 and 6 seed beads. Between the spikes I made points of Superduos. I added more seed beads and a crystal later and went through the spikes quite a few times to try to stabilize it. Still a bit floppy but not too bad.

Next I used 15mm spikes and added a little copper color. This one is much more stable. I have more of this size of spike so I think I will keep playing with the concept.