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Building Botanical Beads: IN PERSON!!!
Want to add a little pizzazz to your strands of stones, pearls, or focal point pendants? Then look no further than this ONSITE workshop, which will teach students to transform flat sterling silver sheet into a dimensional bead using the natural world as inspiration.
With 50 person waiting lists for her virtual classes, we are thrilled to bring visiting artist Taylor Saleem out to Metalwerx in-person for a deep dive into her ever popular Botanical Beads workshop. Don't miss this opportunity to get in-person attention and guidance!
Over the course of three days in our fully equipped studio, participants will learn to take botanical motifs and imagery such as leaf shapes or floral silhouettes and translate them into metal cut-outs. The instructor will cover how to expertly saw out intricate designs from sheet, how to use basic shapes like circles and rectangles to build the body of the bead, and how to then sweat solder the botanical imagery onto the bead, for an elevated and personalized aesthetic.
Wrap up the weekend with an overview of methods for incorporating our new creations into a beaded necklace!
Meet the instructor
Taylor is a full-time metal smith and mother of 2 in St. Louis, MO. She began creating jewelry in 2003 as "The Rare Bird", transitioning from bead work, to wire work. She’s now a self-taught metal smith, building pieces by hand from precious metals, preserving organic flora in sterling silver using lost wax casting techniques, and setting gemstones. She has been featured in Step by Step Wire Jewelry Magazine, Easy Wire Magazine, and ArtJewelry Magazine.
Taylor is deeply inspired by flowers of all shapes and sizes - the emotions and feelings they convey in every leaf, curve of the stem, softness within the petals. She often incorporates their silhouettes or creates organic castings of actual plants to use in her work. Each piece is built one at a time, completely by hand, with its own story, originality, and attention to detail.
Taylor’s creativity is fueled by one of her favorite Psalms - “May God establish the work of my hands.” (Psalm 90:17)
Follow her processes on Instagram at www.Instagram.com/taylorsaleem.
Materials & Tools
There is a $75 materials fee for this workshop payable upon registration. It includes a substantial sheet of sterling silver, sterling silver tubing, saw blades, drill bits, 3M sanding pads, mounted sanding cartridge, buffing block, silver sheet solder, and a diamond needle file set.
- Beads of choice (can be seed beads, stones, etc)
- 4-ply waxed linen
- Pencil
- Fine-line Sharpie
- Closed-toe shoes - mandatory