I’m probably about to disappoint you. Because I’ll bet you read the title of this post and got all excited to learn some tips to make your beadweaving faster and more efficient. But guess what?? Nope.
Instead I felt compelled to tell you all that I’m not a big believer in beadweaving shortcuts. Gasp! I know! It’s not like I haven’t tried them – I do, all the time. And what I find is that taking two stitches at once in a peyote stitch piece inevitably causes more tangles than usual, and the messes are bigger to out of. Cheating on a herringbone stitch by pulling the thread only once through both the downward and upward strokes pulls your beads out of a pristine, straight alignment, and makes for a sloppier looking project.
You are a beadweaver. You’re not in this for speed. Take the slow road, enjoy the process, and your beadwork will thank you by being more beautiful in the end.
One of the secrets to perfect tension with right angle weave is to pass through each bead and pull out the tension in the right direction. It takes more time initially, but will save extra passes to fix loose tension and turn beads the right way. That is my two cents and I like how you see beadweaving as an art that takes time.
Well I do not beadweave, but to me it seems like bead meditation trying to reach a state of serenity. But then I may have gotten it all wrong:-)
Pepita
Yep!! You are so right, almost-beading-sister! The best and only shortcut in beadwork I know is working clean and careful and with all the skill you can afford. So you save all the time you’d otherwise need for untangling threads or ripping out uneven parts. Taking the long way sometimes turns out the short way.
And after all, we do not only beadweave to get a piece of jewelry. We enjoy the process of weaving and dive deep into our almost daily meditation.
YES!!! Finally…beaders who do not think we are in a race. My sisters in beads, I adore you!
I used to be a knitter; bead weaving is speed weaving by comparison and I love it!