Finally, some beading talk and pictures!

I'm still working on this project and, sorry to say, still keeping it hidden.

Part of me is desperate to show you it so I can illustrate what I mean when I talk about it, but I am resolute not to show it until it is published. This is partly because I am really pleased with an idea I have had (which makes the whole things work), and want to explore it as much as possible in private before I see variations of it springing up all around the world. Maybe they won't, and it's just me who thinks it's a great idea, but, just in case, it's staying under wraps for now.

It's amazing just how much this project has changed and evolved, not just over the 10 years since I first thought of it, but especially so in the past week. It really has dramatically altered as I've beaded it, and imagined new variations and solutions, and it grows in my hands. I don't think I've ever had a project alter so much.

I also don't think I have ever beaded something that has taken so many hours. I hugely underestimated the time the 22 components of the necklace base would take. I figured around 1-2 hours each, maybe. But they seem to have taken nearer 4 hours each which straight away added 44-66 extra hours of beading I didn't figure on. Add onto that mistakes, changes, knots etc. and by the time this has finished it will have taken me at least 120 hours; but repeating it would only be around 100.

One thing I will reveal is that it will feature two of these large 30mm crystals as a centrepiece. Originally the pendant (which is also so much more...) was going to be unadorned (well, actually it was going to be completely different) then I had a new idea which involved using a rivoli. Then I decided to up the scale and use one of these. But then I thought, as they are flat-backs, why not use two to make it reversible? And that thought led to a complete re-scaling, re-imaging, re-designing and re-beading of the pendant. The end result is that it is completely different than what I expected, which is nice as I still have the original idea to play around with.

My main problem with the crystals is that I own them in 4 colours (Crystal, Red Magma, Peridot and Gold Dorado) but the Dorado doesn't seem to work. In the end I settled on Crystal and Red Magma but having that peridot left over has got me to think maybe I could make 2 pendants. Wait, hang on a minute. If I just altered it slightly then I could just bead 2 of thse sections and the whole thing....