Winter Colour Diet :: Session #0

I know, I know.... I am starting this more than two months late. It took a little while (longer than I thought) to recover from Christmas, and then there were some business trips and other assorted nonsense in the way in January and early February. Now, I am buckling down to work and can't wait to explore all of the interesting possibilities that this palette presents.

I'm still cheating a little, though, because I technically made these beads (and some real lookers that I'm not showing you) over a few sessions and just haven't been posting about them. Because that is not the way this was supposed to play out at all, I've labelled this collection of beads "Session 0" and will grudgingly not give myself any credit for those sessions.

I have also now started testing the colours in this palette that had not previously been tested by me, so stay tuned for those as well starting last week! The colours I've focused on first have been Effetre's Apple Blush and Dark Violet (already posted), and Wood Legnos and Spanish Leather (coming soon).

Now, before we get into the beads, a quick palette recap. Here are the colours I designated last year as allowable for use in this restricted palette adventure I am on.  Here is a link to my original post.

EFF Spanish Leather, EFF Striking Orange, EFF Opal Yellow, EFF Kelp, EFF Apple Blush, CiM Slytherin, CiM Shrubbery, EFF Mosaic Green, EFF Copper Green, CiM Mint Lozenge, EFF Dark Violet, CiM Evil Queen, EFF Lizard, EFF Oliva Nera, EFF Wood (Legno), EFF Dark Ivory, EFF Ivory, CiM Peace, CiM Tuxedo, EFF Intense Black, REI Clear, REI Raku, PRC Black Pearl, DHX Kalypso, TAG Absinthe

To reiterate the rules in a nutshell, I can use these and only these, with some very minor exceptions for additives such as goldstone, dichro, and silver (and I have since made myself a further allowance for frit and enamels). I can't make any colour substitutions unless I completely use up my stash of a colour, or I lose all the credit I've given myself towards the end goal of eight consecutive torching sessions using these colours together, and have to reset back to zero. This burns a little, because there are some new CiM Limited Runs that I am dying to try, but I am going to have to restrain myself.

On to the beads!

  

Most of these beads are made with a combination of the following five colours: Spanish Leather, Kelp, Shrubbery, Mint Lozenge, and Evil Queen. In some of the beads I'm posting today I've also used Dark Violet, and in other beads I've added Wood, but these beads have only these five somewhat disharmonious colours. Building these beads, I made a tube bead with stripes on it. Then, I raked the stripes and pressed the bead, finally adding the Mint Lozenge wings on the edges and doing some surface decoration.

This is a whole set of beads made with this colour combination. I've been practicing making smaller beads and practicing dots, and this is the result.

This one has both Wood and Dark Violet in addition to the Spanish Leather, Kelp, Shrubbery, Mint Lozenge, and Evil Queen. I really like the contrast between Mint Lozenge and Spanish Leather.

I love this bead. Here, somehow the colour combination worked just a bit better - possibly because Apple Blush played less of a major role. This one has Spanish Leather, Apple Blush, Shrubbery, Mint Lozenge, Dark Violet, and Evil Queen. I made a big ball of Mint Lozenge and drizzled the other colours around and then stretched it out into a tube bead with gravity before pressing it. Then, I added some additional dots and swirls as decoration.

I'm not sure what possessed me to put Mosaic Green dots on top of Wood, because it was a bit of an aesthetic disaster. It was also, however, really interesting from a reaction standpoint. There is no brown glass in this bead - all of the brown is somehow coming out of the Wood (which is not brown) after reacting with the Mosaic Green (also not brown).

These little focals are made with Spanish Leather, Apple Blush, Shrubbery, Evil Queen, and Wood. I really like the crazy things Wood does when it is used on top of Spanish Leather.

Here I used the same colours as in my set above, but with the addition of Wood.

I think this is my favourite bead of the bunch. The top half of the bead is made with a layered cane I made from Mint Lozenge, Shrubbery, and Slytherin. I love how streaky and mottled the colours came out and will definitely be exploring layered cane a little more in coming months. I also had some fun with the shaping of this bead and have ideas to take that a little further.

Since I've been mucking around with these colours for quite some time now, I am actually out of Dark Violet and have replaced it in the palette with Ink Blue Violet, an odd lot of Effetre Ink Blue which is a little less saturated and a little more blue than Dark Violet.