The Great Beaded Gondola
Exciting new pieces often come straight out of other people’s imaginations…. They just need a touch of MaryRoseification. A customer of Miks in Wichita Falls dreamed up the idea of a narrow but long bowl with quite exacting dimensions 6inches wide by 24inches long. She had thought it may be nice on 4 ball feet and have its entire circumference encrusted with beads. Mary Rose found that the shape would look more elegant on a central base because the ends of the bowl could attractively “curl up” rather than having to remain parallel to the ground as they would with ball feet, and also found that the only way to “load” a huge line of ceramic beads onto the rim would be to make them unusually petite. The resulting piece is utterly fascinating and offers all kinds of unexpected fascinations. My eyes are taken with the long lines of all golden beads that glint so richly.