I have a client—a woman whom I'm privileged also to call friend and neighbor—who celebrates her birthday with a bead-curtain strand. Both of us were friends with another woman who, after the death of her partner, decided to return to our neighborhood, with much rejoicing when she moved even closer to our respective houses. This person, also a jeweler (amongst other gifts) gave me a number of furnace beads when she ’d moved away; now, to celebrate her return, I decided to incorporate them into the strand.^[1]

all images from the E620/2016E620/20161125E620 directory. Hollow beads made with assorted gravity swirl stripes. Obviously in a tearing hurry to photograph, the beads weren't even properly dry, though I think the water drops actually lend a bit of interest to the picture.

Typically, the strands are made with orange, (amber) yellow, and olive green, originally to match the wallpaper of the upstairs hallway; but the client moved to a different part of the house, and so the yellow has shifted to a brighter lemon, and for this year, because so many of the furnace beads had turquoise, I allowed touches of that to creep in.

shot with the lensbaby, obviously.

I wanted to incorporate the Italian blown bead technique I learned, so there are some (sigh) not-very-good blown beads in there as well...

different styling, emphasizing those two yellow gravity swirls I obviously was very proud of...

There were so many leftover beads I made some up into a bonus necklace (mostly designed by the recipient.)

Unless otherwise noted, text, image and objects depicted therein copyright 1996--present sylvus tarn.