This blog allows our customers and friends to keep abreast of all the happenings at LB o J'zazz including new products, special finds and our taking you along our educational trips and travels.
For all you Decopatch afficianadoes, Bettina and I have carefully hand selected all the Decopatch papers to cover and create new surfaces. We are bringing back your favorite paper designs and some of the freshest and creative in the selection covering a wider range.
New molds, the menagerie of animals to Decopatch is varied and getting larger too! It's a great way to kick off the summer season while creating activities for home designing or group activities for you and the family. The new collection will be found at our new outlet in Shaab el Bahry mid-May and we will keep you posted. We welcome all of you Decopatchers to send us images of your work as we would like to share and show off all the creative projects of yours too!
On an interior enhancement note- we personalized our new shop by Decopatching our electrical outlets and the aircondition grille make sure you come by and see us.
The Bead Museum in Washington, DC is home to one of the most comprehensive exhibits and collections of beads on the planet. Located downtown on 7th Street it is also the abode to the Greater Washington Bead Society. In 2008, The Bead Museum initiated its first International Juried Competition covering twelve separate media categories. The jurors were Mixed Media Artist Joyce J. Scott, Lampwork pioneer Kate Fowle Melaney, Polymer Clay Master Grant Diffendafer, Quilter Laura Cater-Woods and Ricki Pelzman.
Over 443 artists from fourteen countries and forty states within the US took part in this endeavor. I decided it was high time to put out some of my work to see how jurors and peers would gauge the one of a kind objects. We were requested to get high resolution images sent and the category I entered two pieces in was: Seed Beads. Two beaded collars from the series were submitted: Medusa in Beige and Fossil Paths.
In May of 2008, I received a letter that Fossil Paths was chosen as a Finalist and to ship the original piece to the Bead Museum for the final showing. With only three days left to qualify for the jury selection, we had to send the original piece all the way to DC. Luckily, we made the deadline and the piece shown in the image above was chosen as a finalist. The event was highlighted on September 20th, 2008 in the 3rd Annual Passion for Beads Gala Dinner honoring the artists who had participated. Another intra-cultural dialogue that we continue to be a part of.
The process was exciting in itself, assembling a 400 million year old fossil (Ortheceras) found in Morocco as the focal point, vintage seed beads from the Czech Republic, silver bead caps from Bali and Japanese magatama beads ( the drop beads edging the piece) and a customized clasp connection all in the peyote stitch technique and fringing here, in a quiet basement studio tucked away in a neighborhood in Kuwait to enter an international competition for the first time and then to be recognized and celebrated by an accomplished jury of artists in itself was truly an experience to remember.
Pecha Kucha kicked off it's inaugural event at the Maidan Theater of the Dar Al Athar Al Islammiya. On March 11, at 7 PM Professor Aseel Al Ragam launched the evening that is part of a global network of happenings.
Eight presenters or "performers" so to speak, and the format is twenty x twenty. Twenty slides, each slide is twenty seconds; amounting to six minutes and forty seconds of intense and heady ideas be presented to the audience. As the last presenter of the evening and to a full house, I was able to share Kindred Spirits: An Intracultural Exploration and Dialogue Through Beads.
We welcome your comments and input. Be sure to watch out for the next PKN in your city and the upcoming PKN Kuwait this June.
Bettina and Lubna after four years of talking and dreaming about a buying and sourcing trip to the Czech Republic in search of artisans, glass, beads and more beads to bring back to you here in Kuwait finally did it!! From February 25th until March the 8th the beadaholics headed up north to the cold weather in Prague and the snow laden hills and slopes of Jablonec.
We will give you a photo and travelogue update that includes visiting the famous glass capital region of Jablonec and the cottage industry of pressed glass, seed beads, machine cut beads and special stones and cabochons. We would recommend visiting Prague as it is truly a city of beauty, layers of architecture, craftsmanship in the Medieval, Gothic, Baroque and Art Nouveau styles and periods abound.
