The Art of Beadwork: Historic Inspiration, Contempory Design

I have been doing beadwork, writing about beadwork, researching beads and beadwork, devoting my master's degree work to beadwork ... everything I have ever done these past 10 years seem to relate to beads ... even vacations with my wife center on going to specific bead stores, collections and museums. This book is PHENOMENAL! There are things in this book that I could never have dreamed about. The photography, illustrations and explanations for the projects are first rate. Linking them to traditional pieces is brilliant. This is the one book that will change the face of beadwork to come in the future.

Beadworkers have traditionally received less volume and detail in their guidebooks than quilters, but the genre is growing and has been enhanced by the addition of Valerie Hector's The Art Of Beadwork: Historic Inspiration, Contemporary Design. Valerie Hector is a famous jewelry designer who invited several artists to use a piece of beadwork from another time or culture as inspiration for creating a new piece: The Art Of Beadwork celebrates this effort, blending history and an overview of cross-cultural beading traditions with artist profiles and fun projects for creating necklaces, earrings, pins and more. With the world as its inspiration, The Art Of Beadwork features inspirational pieces from around the world, with diagrams and easy project notes assuring relative newcomers will be able to duplicate the polished results.

I received my book 2 days ago. I looked through it and though I'm by no means done going through it, I had to jump in and try the cubic right angle weave. It's so cool! The great thing about this book is the unusual weaves. Definitely not the same ol' stuff you see all the time. I'm an experienced beader and am always on the lookout for books that are not geared to the beginning beader. This book is really wonderful. As another reviewer said. She presents the possibilites in photos, then gives the general instructions, suggests other design possibilities leaving the rest to your imagination. The instructions given were clear and concise and enough to continue on your own (provided you're not a beginning beader.) If you're an intermediate to advanced beader looking for new things to try, you've GOT to have this book. Beginning beaders will enjoy seeing the wonderful possibilities that can be viewed in this book but will probably want to get a good handle on weaving techniques before jumping into the projects offered here. I can't wait to get back to this book and trying some more of the techniques. My upcoming vacation will be filled with hours devoted to this book. I wasn't familiar with the author before but will definitely be watching for her name from now on. GREAT BOOK!