Today I went to the Essex Bead Fair in Tiptree with a friend. We were a little later arriving than expected as some helpful Road Repair people had put ‘Road Closed’ signs up and a diversion. Thing is the diversion just took you round in circles, and to get to the venue you had to ignore the signs and go down the ‘closed’ road. So what should have been a short journey from her home became a magical mystery tour of north Essex with an increasingly grumpy driver. (The grumpy driver would be me by the way)
Anyway, once there we fortified ourselves with tea (always a good way to calm me down) and headed off to see what we could find. One of the ‘stalls’ was a display stand of some amazing pieces created out of beads where I took I these photos. (Sorry about the quality – I only had the camera on my mobile)
Don’t these chocolates look good enough to eat!
Or a drink which definitely looks alcoholic…
Tinny anyone?
These beautiful cuddly looking toys weren’t so cuddly when you realised that they were made completely out of tiny beads.
I have mixed feelings about beading. On the one hand you get amazing pieces like these where the artistry is plain to see. There were some stunning beads you could easily imagine forming part of jewellery in a select little boutique. Gorgeous semi-precious stones, freshwater pearls and cut crystal. Unfortunately, alongside all this beauty was stuff that looked like it had been found inside a really cheap Christmas cracker. Of course I guess it’s the same for any craft. Does beading have it’s own version of a ‘yarn snob’ I wonder?
That said, I didn’t come home empty handed as I bought a couple of pendants, but I’ll blog about them another time. In part because one is a fossil my inner geek wants to research more, but also because I’m feeling the urge for another cup of tea… Hmm… Time to put the kettle on again.
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