Hapua Reef Cuff Bracelet  

Bead Embroidery has been used to embellish and decorate clothing since the dawn of civilization. In both Russia and China, remains have been found of bead embroidery dating back thousands of years. In more recent history, bead embroidery has been used to decorate religious items, formal attire, and household objects.

Here I create a canvas, decide how to give form to this canvas, plan a design, and embroider that design onto my formed-canvas. The challenge is always to achieve a contemporary, artistic look to your piece -- one that has a sense of movement, dimensionality, a use of materials that makes the ordinary 'noteworthy', and good technique.

In this piece, I wanted to re-create the colors, patterns and lines of the beautiful forms, waves and materials along the shoreline of a tropical lagoon and the underlying reef in the Caribbean. I especially liked looking through the shallow water where it met the beach at a particularly secluded part of the lagoon.

In the composition, I used 10 different bead-embroidery techniques.

PRICING

As pictured, the embroidered foundation is afixed to a brass cuff blank, which will fit comfortably on a 6 1/2 - 7" wrist.

$650.00

This cuff bracelet can be made for a larger wrist by dispensing with the cuff blank, and adding a clasp.

add $150.00