New Chain Maille Book!

Bead World has a new book!  Advanced Chain Maille is the newest instructional book to be published by the team at Bead World.  Written by Brittany Egidi, our resident chain maille goddess, this is the third installment in our ongoing chain maille series.  (Brittany's previous books include Beginning Chain Maille and Intermediate Chain Maille.)  In this new book, Brittany tackles challenging traditional patterns as well as chains with captured crystals and Czech glass cheerios.  (A helm bracelet, one of the included patterns, is shown above left.)  Advanced Chain Maille is perfect for the experienced chain maille artist who is looking for fun new ideas and wants to take their skills to the next level. 

Advanced Chain Maille includes:

• Helm (Parallel) Chain
• Japanese Diamond Earrings
• Captive Inverted Round (with 4mm round beads)
• Cheerio Byzantine Variation
• Elfweave

Think Outside of the Box!

This fun little bracelet was created by Frongelyn Booker at our Phoenix store.  It highlights a number of non-traditional elements in a very sophisticated, cohesive way.  The large double-drilled pietersite sets the rich, organic color pallet for the piece.  Small faceted garnet rondelles bring in some light and sparkle.  The metals used in this bracelet, Vintaj antiqued brass and copper, are a perfect compliment to the gemstones.
Frongelyn did two particularly interesting things with this piece.  First, she used a single strand toggle with a two stranded bracelet.  Contrary to popular, this is a completely reasonable thing to do!  You just need to be certain that the last few beads on the toggle bar end can fit through the toggle ring opening.  Secondly, she used small copper jump rings as a spacer!  This bracelet looks great, and shows that you can do amazing things when you think outside of the box!