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I just found my camera cord after several weeks of it being AWOL, so pardon the sudden explosion of photo posts.

( Not safe for work if your work frowns on artistic glass nudity. )

So I posted about the Viking-era swastika bead a few days ago. albreda said she'd wear it if I made it, so I turned on my torch tonight and gave it a shot.*

Original:
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My personal challenge as part of the A&S 50 project has been to identify and recreate 50 different period glass bead designs. So far, I'm more than halfway there, but this is the first documentation I've posted online.


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I spent most of my afternoon in the online collections of the Swedish National Historical Museum, looking at the glass beads in their collections. If there's one thing historical lampworking has taught me, it's how to say "glass bead" in half a dozen different languages I don't actually speak ( Read more... )

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I have been looking for the following book for several years now:

Callmer, Johan. Trade Beads and Bead Trade in Scandinavia ca. 800 - 1000 AD. Acta Archaeologica Lundensia 4th Series, No. 11. Lund: Munksgaard. 1977. ISBN 3774913757.

It is not available in my state via Interlibrary Loan; my town library won't get stuff from outside Vermont. :(

It also ( Read more... )

            17. Melon bead. See #3.

18. Blue segmented bead. See #5.

Bottom strand:

1. Blue and yellow swirly bead - this is a period-plausible simple spacer bead of my own design.


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While most of my glasswork is the reproduction of historically authentic styles, I learned a new, modern technique yesterday.

( Potentially NSFW, if your workplace frowns on representations of female nudity in art )

Thanks to Mistress Aine Callaghan, who has been kind enough to occasionally let me use her set-up for lampwork, I went out on a limb & bought my own last month.

This is what I've been up to:


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