Kamloops North Shore Art Walk

As a member of the Kamloops Art Council, I am excited to be in the Kamloops North Shore Art Walk this year.  Each participating artist is teamed up with a local business on the north shore where their work is on display (and for sale) from July 29 to September 5.  Our jewelry will be at Heather's Fabric Shelf which is a perfect match for us as they already sell our buttons.

Here is a photo of our display featuring our bargello style pieces which we felt fit in with all the gorgeous and colorful quilting fabric.

This is one of the new sets on display in a Pantone summer color combination of Coral Rose, Beeswax and  Peapod.

Announcing the Winner of our Naming Contest

We had a lot of great name suggestions come in.  A big thank-you to those who contributed.  We narrowed it down to three that we especially liked and want to give an honorable mention to Cynthia Blanton -- she gave a lot of good suggestions and we especially liked the one "Western Glitz" and an honorable mention to Kim Sturgis for the name "Country Class".

The name we chose as the winner is "Country Charm" from Dana and will be the official name for our  "Country Charm Collection".   Thank you Dana and we will e-mail you the $25 gift certificate.

And here are some of the new Bargello pieces finally finished:

More Bargello

I'm still experimenting with the Bargello in the same color combo of Honeysuckle, Beeswax and Peapod I showed you yesterday.  This time I used the color peapod as the background and below that shows one done on a black background and a different pattern.

I made a piece that has no background showing at all which gives it a totally new look again.  These are all done from the same blended cane.

What do you think?

Bargello

Bargello is a needlepoint embroidery technique originally used for pillows and upholstery.  The stitches are done in a pattern using many hues of each color resulting in intricate shading effects.     Laura Liska created this same look in polymer clay in the most beautiful colors and patterns.  She fortunately shared her technique with Lindly Haunani and Maggie Maggio which is in their book, Polymer Clay Color Inspirations.

I followed this technique to create some Bargello style pieces but with my own color combinations from the Pantone Spring 2011 colors of Honeysuckle, Beeswax and Peapod.  You will find the recipes for these colors in my last blog post here.

This technique requires concentration and a very steady hand to achieve straight lines and a consistent pattern.  The first one I did on the Honeysuckle color background and was my first crack at it.  I love the effect from the deep colored background.  The one below shows the same cane on the Beeswax background with a different pattern which has a totally different look.

And of course I had to make a lentil swirl from this gorgeous color combo!

My next stage is to make some beads from these Bargello clay sheets and will show you later when they are complete...

More Pantone Color Recipes - Beeswax and Peapod

I decided to start the new year with two more color recipes from the top ten spring 2011 Pantone collection - Beeswax and Peapod.  Both recipes use Kato clay for the mix and you will notice I've added a little pearl or metallic clay of some form to each color.  I find these give that little extra shimmer and added depth.

Beeswax

6 parts Yellow

2 parts Gold

1 part White

1 part Pearl

                                                         

Peapod

3 parts Green

3 parts Yellow

1 part Black

3 parts White

3 parts Pearl

This is a fun skinner blend cane I created with the Beeswax, Peapod and Honeysuckle.  You will find the Honesuckle recipe I shared with you earlier here.  I will show you tomorrow what I'm doing with these colors.