I’m Giving Away My Bead Weaving Patterns!

June 11, 2010 in Bead Weaving, Beads, Color, Patterns, Seed Beads | Tags: , , | 1 comment

I had so much fun giving patterns to the winners of the “Answer & Win” contest in May that I’ve decided to give away my beautiful seed bead weaving patterns for FREE and will continue, 2 by 2 a month, until they are all free!

This includes peyote, brick stitch, square stitch, and looming versions.

June features are “Celebration” (one of my most popular) and “Lotus Blossom.”

Tell all bead weaving maniacs to come and get ’em! (PDF downloads only, not the hard copies.)

Click the link, then scroll down to find the free patterns.

Margie’s PDF patterns

Tribute to the Creatures of the Gulf of Mexico

June 2, 2010 in Color | 6 comments

Heartbroken over the devastation in the Gulf of Mexico, I’ve been researching the threatened wildlife, and drawing a tribute to them in my sketchbook. Here are some of my pages… there are more to come…

How Bead Finishes Interact with Color

June 1, 2010 in Artistry, Beads, Color | 2 comments

excerpt from the June 2010 Margie’s Muse column

Seed beads are chameleons. They change their color—sometimes dramatically. When strung as a hank, seed beads will enchant you, casting a spell that sounds like “Buy me. You can’t live without my color.” Then when you stitch or string it alongside ten other colors (you couldn’t live without) they darken or lighten, disappear or pop out jarringly.

Glass beads are the grandest of visual tricksters. The smaller the bead, the trickier the tricks. Color changes radically based on the light source, surrounding beads, thread, background, bead finish, and other factors.

For example: did you know that when you look at the surface of a silver-lined bead you see about 50% reflected light and 50% reflected color? If it’s a green silver-lined bead, you are not seeing all green… you are actually seeing much of the light source illuminating the bead.

A bead’s color is altered by its surface finish. Depending on the bead’s finish, the same hue of green can appear hard and rough or soft and smooth, iridescent as cellophane or solid as velvet.


Admittedly, our pre-mixed medium of beads limits our color selection. However, surface finishes give us a creative playground unavailable in other mixable mediums such as paint. Red paint is altered only by another color or substance (oil, glaze, varnish). In contrast, red in the form of beads comes in a matte finish, semi-matte, opaque, transparent, iris, pearlescent, or some combination of the above.

Understanding a beads’ reflectivity as well as color provides a more comprehensive approach to designing with beads.

Start by thinking in terms of reflectivity first, color second when you are choosing colors. When you look at a particular bead, how much light are you seeing? How much actual color are you receiving?

…To read entire article with many more photos & a downloadable PDF, go to Margie’s Muse …


I offer a one-day class exploring the issues presented by bead finishes. I also offer an on-line class at CraftEdu titled “Seed Bead Finishes and Their Interaction with Color.” At the end of this hour long class you will:

  • know the major categories of seed bead finishes and you’ll understand how each interacts with light and reflects color
  • be able to make confident choices to create the effects you want in your beaded jewelry and art
  • be able to enjoy the thrill of working with seed beads creatively, artistically, and expressively.

    • Mastering the Trickery of Bead Finishes

    May 10, 2010 in Color | Leave a comment

    We’ve been working for months, and finally CraftEdu.com has launched! Its an online class site offering the finest professional instructors (me included!) for all kinds of media.

    One of the trickiest issues we bead artists deal with is the play of light and color on different finishes of glass. Glass beads are the grandest of visual tricksters. The smaller the bead, the trickier the tricks. Color changes radically based on the light source, surrounding beads, thread, background, bead finish, and other factors.

    I’ve developed a 2-part online class at CraftEdu.com called “Seed Bead Finishes and Their Interaction with Color.” In the class I explain major groups of finishes (opaque, transparent, matte, silver-lined, ceylon, and more) and we explore how much light they reflect, and how much color they transmit. If you can grasp that, you’ll be able to make much more conscious choices in finishes and color.

    I also outline problems we encounter with certain finishes, and things to be aware of.

    Here are some of the screen shots from the class:


    If you are confused about how light and color work with different finishes, you’ll love this class. Stop by for a FREE preview.

    Also, I am offering a promotional special: if you buy one of my classes at CraftEdu.com, I’ll give you a FREE Color Report for Bead and Jewelry Designers. (You’ll need to email me after you register for the class.)

    While you are at CraftEdu.com, be sure to watch my FREE overview of what you can do with seed beads… I had a lot of fun with it:

    Seed Beads: Is There Anything They Can’t Do?

    Organize Your Color for Better Color Choices

    May 4, 2010 in Color | 2 comments

    excerpted from the May 2010 “Margie’s Muse” column (free downloadable PDF)

    The definition of being organized is that you know exactly where you can find what you are looking for. For the most part, I am, even though it might not be apparent to one who walks in my studio. Other than tax documents, the most organized area of my life is color.

    My oil paint swatches wall gives me the space to stare at colors in relation to other hues for long periods of time. Each swatch gradates from the purest version of the color on the left to a tint lightened with white on the right.

    I organize my colors with chromatic meticulousness in every medium I work in (beads, colored pencils, oils, acrylic, pastels, markers… the list goes on). I do this not only because I thoroughly enjoy it and it allows me to understand the hues in relation to other hues, but also because it allows me the freedom to make stronger color choices more easily.

    Sometimes students bring in all their colors to show me: they’ve piled every hue, value, intensity and shade are in the same container. No wonder they are intimidated by color. Its overwhelming to look at and try to make sense of. Overwhelming and exhausting.

    When colors are organized in a logical fashion, the intimidation factor dramatically drops. When your eye sees order, your mind can think more clearly and can make more informed choices.

    When colors are organized chromatically, I see blocks of hues first: yellows, oranges, reds, violets, blues, greens. Within the blocks of hue I arrange according to value and intensity as best I can. Now I can see clearly what is available and can easily pick the tones I want to experiment with.
    I do this on the computer as well…

    read the entire article here…

    My green drawer these days is a little less tidy than I prefer

    Color Influence in Marketing

    April 27, 2010 in Color, Fashion, Marketing, Sales | 5 comments

    There are many of these articles around.  This one from doc4design.com is worth the read. Not only for how well it makes its point, but also for that fantastic “speech” about cerulean blue in fashion that Meryl Streep lashes Anne Hathaway with in the movie “The Devil Wears Prada.” I loved that “speech” and its great to be able to read it.

    http://www.doc4design.com/articles/color-trends-better-outlook/

    See the Art Bead Scene Color Challenge Results

    April 14, 2010 in Color | 2 comments

    Remember the Art Bead Scene Color Challenge based on a palette from the Spring/Summer 2010 Color Report for Bead & Jewelry Designers?

    The entries are posted! What a thrill to see the endless variations of this refreshing palette. This demonstrates the unique beauty of expression and voice an artist can infuse into their color work:

    Lyn Foley

    All Entries

    And the winner is…Lyn Foley! For a prize Lyn receives two year’s worth of Color Reports and a $50 gift certificate from Humblebeads.com. Judges included Marcia DeCoster, Jane Dickerson and Lorelei Eurto. Here is Lyn’s winning piece, and the two stunning runner-ups:

    Art Bead Scene

    Lyn Foley, Gretchen Coates, and Anna Lear created beautiful, memorable pieces, each interpreting the palette in a unique way. I’m delighted by how different each piece is, even though the color scheme is the same. Gretchen leaned toward lighter, paler expression, Lyn and Anna used bright, fully saturated version of the palette members.

    Gretchen Coates

    Visit their blogs to see more of their expressive work:

    LYN FOLEY

    GRETCHEN COATS

    ANNA LEAR

    Anna Lear

    You See What You Think You See…

    March 31, 2010 in Color | 10 comments

    … not what truly is.

    Colors in context are a great example. They visually shift and fluctuate, in an ever moving dance with the colors and light around them.

    My favorite illusion proving this was designed by Edward H. Adelson of Dept. of Brain and Cognitive Sciences at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Here it is: (click image to see larger version)

    The copyright holder of this file allows anyone to use it for any purpose, provided that the copyright holder is properly attributed. Redistribution, derivative work, commercial use, and all other use is permitted.

    Square A and Square B are the same shade of gray, the same color. Oh yes they are!

    I can’t see it, either: my mind cannot reconcile the fact that they are exactly the same, because B is the lighter square, even though it’s in shadow (so my mind tells me).

    Here’s proof that they are the same. I covered up the surrounding area– the context. Now it’s easy to see that they are the same (click image to see larger version).

    A dear friend and her husband run a commercial & residential painting company. They tell me great color and people stories. One of my favorite, and a frequently occurring one, is the client who looks at two different walls painted in the same color and vehemently accuses their company of using two different paint colors. Because walls in a room face different directions and they receive light differently: one may be in more shade, the sun may be setting casting a very bluish or pinkish light on the other wall. Several factors may be involved. But the paint on each wall came from the same can. Its the same color.

    We have a lot of fun in my color classes debating which color is lighter, darker, more intense, less intense. Its a bit easier for us to answer those questions because for the most part we are comparing swatches of flat color to each other in the same light. They aren’t any rigid context, like these checkerboard squares.

    I share this issue with you to remind you that when you are dealing with color: COLOR IS RELATIVE. The color you think you see is relative to the colors surrounding it, the atmosphere, the lighting…many factors. You see what you think you see, not what truly is.

    Being conscious of this empowers you to make more conscious, informed color choices.

    For an in-depth explanation of the fascinating subject of metamerism, read the May 2007 Margie’s Muse: “Metamerism in Action.”

    Landscape of the Soul

    March 24, 2010 in Artistry, Color, emotions | Leave a comment

    "Golden Earring" from Beading Her Image

    Excerpt from Margie’s Muse, April 2010

    I am and always have been fascinated with faces. I have a library full of portrait photography books, just to study faces. I draw them on a weekly, if not daily, basis. I photograph them. (I wish I could ask more strangers if I can photograph them, but the few times I have, it frightens folks… so I stick to people I know.) I go to the movies in hopes of big screen close ups… giant faces. I’m thrilled when they are so big I can see the pores! Women, men, any race, any color, any age (the older the more intriguing)… it doesn’t matter… I love faces.

    I draw and paint so many faces that people tend to label this preoccupation as portrait painting. But I’m not a portrait painter. I am not as interested in who I am painting as I am the expressions and the feeling that the face conveys. I prefer depicting faces of people I don’t know so I don’t get caught up in trying to create a realistic portrait. And I don’t use flesh tones or realistic colors.

    I consider my depictions of faces “landscapes of the Soul,” not portraits.

    "Iris" from the book Beading Her Image

    It is the Soul I am seeking. The Soul beyond the face.

    A painting hangs on our meditation room wall. Its my favorite of all I have painted so far. When I sit quietly and look at it and let it look at me, I sense myself standing taller. I feel a surge of being filled with more power than I am aware of throughout my day. I look at Her face and realize “This is who I want to be. Everything I sense in this face is where I am headed.”

    These are the kinds of feelings and thoughts I want my landscapes of the Soul to inspire in viewers. I want them to instill a sense of more in each viewer: “There is more than this I see right now. I can be more. I can want more. I am more than who I think I am.”

    I chose to create Beading Her Image for two reasons: to unabashedly indulge myself in the study of more faces. And to honor the sacred of women: those innate qualities that women have (and often deny) of power, charm, compassion, and beauty (not the magazine kind).

    Beading Her Image has been out 5 years now, and is not slowing in popularity.

    My hope is that the beaded landscapes of the Soul in the book fill you with more of your own beauty.

    To see all the accompanying photos and close ups for this article, download the Margie’s Muse PDF version.

    [Beading Her Image is on sale 25% off through April 30, 2010]

    Project Runway Judges: Do You Know Color?

    March 4, 2010 in Artistry, Beads, Color, Fashion, Jewelry, Sales | 43 comments

    In the Feb. 18, 2010 episode of Project Runway guest judge Tory Burch said “I’m not sure that blue and orange are that complementary, do you think so?” Heidi, Michael, and Nina (the show’s regular judges) agreed with her.

    Maybe Tory meant “I’m not sure that blue and orange are that complimentary, do you think so?”

    In either case she – and they – are wrong. And it irks me that fashion designers don’t take the time to understand how colors interact with one another.

    Blue and orange are complementary: they visually complete each other. Blue and orange are also complimentary: conveying a compliment, something that is flattering.

    I’ve run across so many people that should understand color, but don’t: interior designers, graphic designers, jewelry designers, painters, artists of all mediums. And now, the top fashion designers in the USA.

    Color is absolutely critical to these professions — it can make or break a project. Color influences mood, decisions, behavior. It definitely influences how people spend (or don’t spend) money.

    It’s shocking to me that these artists do not see the value of learning about color. Why wouldn’t artists want to expand their color knowledge (and possibly their income) to develop their mastery? It’s not hard, and it’s a lot of fun.

    Leaving a BeadFest show I shared a shuttle van with another teacher and her assistant. They asked what I did and I told them I taught color. The assistant said “You should see [the teacher in the van]’s work – she’s great with color!” And they opened up many cases of her beadwork. It was all the same three pale colors used in combination. They were lovely combinations, not a thing wrong with them. But over and over the same combinations, the same degree of paleness, the same predictability. (I bet she doesn’t know that humans can see the most subtle shift in color, and can visually distinguish perhaps as many as 10 million colors.)

    Years ago, before I’d published my color books, a very well-known bead author said to me “No one will want to spend time learning about color: there’s just not that much to learn. I know what works well together.” (By the way, after 40 years of doing so, I still study color on a regular basis and am still learning.)

    I find many artists engaging in two severly limiting behaviors: operating under the the arrogant assumption that they know all there is to know about color, and limiting their work to a couple of combinations they feel safe with. They don’t risk anything. The price is that they don’t gain anything. There’s no personal voice singing through the work, you can see and feel the timidity of playing it safe. It’s mediocre. It’s boring.

    As artists on a path of growth we start with the academics: theory and the color wheel. We learn the basics so we know how colors interact optically and impact us emotionally. Then we have the confidence to expand into our own voice, working intuitively and expressively on a solid foundation of learned knowledge. Then comes the magic. Then the mastery. Then the whole cycle all over again, many times, microcosmically and macrocosmically. A never ending, fun-filled journey, rich with rewards.

    Congratulations and thank you, Dear Reader. You are not one of the folks blindly unconscious to the value of understanding color. You would not be reading this if you were!

    Project Runway Judges: You are welcome to take any of my classes and learn about color with me. I can show you 50 ways to make the complementary colors blue and orange look fantastically complimentary. We did it in my Denver classes.