Tila trials

Well, seeing how my bead block kind of faded away this last week or two (read more about that here), I finally got around actually finish a couple of tila projects. While I've made a few swatches just to test how I could stitch with them, it wasn't until now that I actually made a whole project.

First out was the rivoli above. It's by now means a perfect project, but I really enjoyed creating this slightly unusual beaded bezel. The flipside looks exactly the same as the front, but the tila beads are a bit crowded: next time I'll only use seed beads for the back. As for colours, I just had to work with what I had eventhough the colour combo isn't my best one. Matte black tilas and seeds and a 18 mm custom coated Swarovski rivoli in peridot glacier blue.

I was planning on making a bracelet as well, but not this one. What happened was that I stumbled over Jennifer VanBenschoten's article Diagonal Stitch for Tila Beads and her Elegant Tila Bead Bracelet project. The stitch looked fun and interesting so I put my original idea aside in order to give this a try.

I didn't mean to embellish it with these seed beads. I tried a few different ideas, but in the end it was my choice of clasp -- a black and gold glass button given to me -- that made me go with the Permanent Finish golden 11/0. Ideally I wanted to use 15/0 matte beads in the tips, but I couldn't find them so I had to settle with larger 11/0 Czech seeds.

For the loop, I stitched a row of herringbone. Again, nothing I originally planned (thought I'd do a simple three rows of peyote instead of just stringing the beads). But when I began fastening the first beads agains the tilas, it came natural to do it in herringbone stitch instead.

And now I have to get more tila beads! Love playing with them and the new possibilites as well as challenges these two-hole beads offer. I've got so many more ideas to try, but -- alas -- I just have barely a dozen beads left right now...