WEST COAST ROAD TRIP - Part 2...

I didn't mention that we were in the San Francisco area for BEER, did I?? Brad is a homebrewer & the National Homebrewers Conference was in Oakland, June 18-20. So... while Brad was @ the conference, I spent 2 full days with Hadar Jacobson @ her studio in Berkeley, working with silver, bronze & copper metal clays! It was FANTASTIC! I learned so much & made some really cool things. Hadar is a sweet lady... quiet & patient & extremely talented! It was awesome seeing her fantastic pieces in person. Being from out of town, I attended her Thursday & Friday morning AND evening classes & then stayed in the studio in between... so lots of time to learn & play. What I didn't expect was that Hadar would be there in those in between times, too... continuing to show me the ropes. It was very cool... one-on-one time w/ Hadar.

Here are some of the pieces that I made...


I just love this piece... it was great to see how Hadar pieces pieces together like this... I would've done it the hard way.
















This piece was made from an actual pebble... it was so great to know how this was done... definitely a technique I will use again (& again & again). See the groove going around the "fabric wrap"? The plan is to wrap some copper wire around there... just haven't decided how to tie it off yet. As I was drilling the holes for the chain, I felt like I was giving "LARRYBOY" a lobotomy. Poor Larryboy. :o)



Silver & Copper cylinders waiting to be wired up for earrings. Another fantastic lesson... combining silver & copper clays... not as straigforward as you'd think.






This copper & bronze piece still needs a little refining, but another awesome technique.



Needless to say...I'm so happy that I decided to take a class w/ Hadar! My initial thought was to find a glass class to take. There are so many things I can do to combine metal clay w/ my glasswork... I'm excited about all of the possibilities!

We stayed in Oakland across the street from the conference, which was really nice & convenient... Brad had classes all day, including sampling of beer & different events in the evening... the last thing I needed was to worry about him trying to find his way back to the hotel on BART (Bay Area Rapid Transit - their train system). :o)

Saturday, while Brad attended the last day of the conference, I took BART into San Francisco in the morning to meet up w/ an online lampworking friend, Hayley Tsang & her sister, Helen (I met Helen @ Hadar's on Thursday!). My timing was PERFECT, as the Northern California chapter of ISGB (International Society of Glass Beadmakers) were meeting up at Arrow Springs, a lampwork glass & tools supplier, for an annual bead bazaar! It was awesome! First of all, it was a 2 1/2 hour drive (north of Sacramento), so lots of time for the three of us to get to know eachother. I saw Sharon Peters, whom I had missed seeing @ Bead & Button this year...also got to meet some great online glass friends... Lisa Fletcher, Toni Lutman, Sadie Cuming (whom I actually met @ Hadar's, too!), Jelveh Jaferian, Aimee Milan, Lena Rhodes & so many others...& of course Donna Milliron, of Arrow Springs. (no, I didn't get a chance to meet her husband, Craig, dang!) Did lots of bead trading... plenty of my acorns are out there now. :o) It was great to see Arrow Springs' facility, too.

Ended up spending the evening @ Hayley's w/ her boyfriend & Helen, too... they made a fabulous chicken curry dish & we spent the evening checking out eachother's beads & pieces that they've made @ Hadar's... & chatting about people that we know online. It was a fun day!

I LOVE meeting people in person that I know online... it makes the online experience that much more personal. You can not only picture THEM now, but you know their voice & mannerisms, etc.

On to Part 3...