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Friday, April 03, 2009

Beadmaking Classes


Jen showed me how to make the Bird's Nest rings last night - they are way cool and she's right about them being dead easy! It got me thinking about lampwork beads in the rings! We think they'd work better if they were flattened on one side - but we're both pretty stoked about the possibilities! I'm going to try making some especially for rings!

Which brings me (in a roundabout way) to the topic of beadmaking classes - the idea is to melt rods of glass onto a stainless steel rod - to make glass beads! Lampworking is the traditional name - so called because it used to be a little oil-lamp that provided the flame. Nowadays, we have nice clean-burning torches - so you will hear the term "torchworking" or "flameworking" too.

What ever you call it - it is a waaaay cool thing to do - very relaxing and meditative and zen-like in the process - and the product is all these cool beads! We've been offering classes in bead-making for a long time and we're quite well-known for it. We have students come here from Europe, Brasil and India to take classes!

Right now, we offer a 4-hour introduction class, an 8-hour 2-day weekend class, and an 20-hour 8-week class - in addition to private classes.

We've being wondering about mixing these up a bit, adding new classes, offering them in different time-slots - so we thought we'd ask for your opinions.

The 4-hour intro is currently offered on a late Tuesday afternoon/evening - but did you know if you have even only 2 people - you can book it when ever? What do you think about this on a Saturday or Sunday?

The 20 hour 8-week class is currently on Thursday evenings - 7 - 9:30 (to give time to get away from work and make it through traffic.) Anyone interested in doing this on Saturdays, instead of Thursdays?

Other classes we've discussed - that we'd like to know if you are interested in:

  • 5 day intensive workshop - for complete beginners
  • 5 day intensive intermediate workshop - for those who have a little experience and want to stretch their wings.
  • teach the teacher - for those who have some experience and been thinking about teaching lampworking
  • guest teachers from the U.S. - "name" instructors with a major reputation - this would be for intermediate and advanced students. Who would you like to see?
Leave us comments or email us directly to let us know what you think!

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