Tuesday, November 18, 2008

Green, Yellow, Orange Beads


I hit a snag before the weekend on the beading. I tried numerous combinations of colors and styles and sequences of beads with little satisfaction. What I thought would work on the blocks with the dark red background simply wasn't working - partly because of my limited number of black beads. Yesterday I resolved that by dropping by the quilt shop (making a beeline to the beads and ignoring any other temptations!). Now I have three different types of black beads in quantity.

As you can see, I beaded three lines on the upper right block before calling a time out. It doesn't show well in the picture, but those yellow beads were showing up much more than other beaded areas. I'd tried to temper it by mixing in a few black beads, but as I said, I didn't have many so what few I used wasn't having the desired effect. As Mary Stori commented, beading shouldn't overpower and I felt this combination was doing just that.

Rather than take them off, though, I decided to see if I felt the same after I'd beaded some adjacent areas. On the left I used green beads with yellow/gold inserted on either side of the large beads. Those big ones have quite a spark to them compared to the smaller green beads, and that little bit of yellow toned them right down. On the lower right, I used those gunmetal grey twisted beads again with a pop of orange/red bead in between. Again, the photo doesn't show the true effect well - those beads don't show nearly as brightly in real life. Click on the photo for a larger view.

Another reason I didn't remove that one section of beading is that its impact changed drastically with the light. While I beaded in daylight, it screamed, "Look at me!" But when I went back in after dark and turned on the overhead light, it was subdued and whispering, "I'll be quiet and fit right in." It's true that with the other beading in the surrounding blocks, it doesn't pull the eye to it as much, but I still think it would benefit from a change of where the black beads fall.

No comments: