Welcome to Studio Saturday! Each week one of our contributors gives you a sneak peek into their studio, creative process or inspirations. We ask a related question of our readers and hope you’ll leave comments! As an incentive we offer a free prize each week to bribe you to use that keyboard. The following week we choose a random winner.
Last week’s winner is Lissc ! Congratulations! You have won a set of Lynn’s openwork disks. Send an email to Lynn and she will get them right out to you.
Welcome to the Studio of Cindy Gimbrone!
Well, the seeds I planted last Winter are bearing fruit this summer. Yup, I’ve done some “reverse gardening” but not with plants, with the Double Dips, turning them into published easy jewelry projects. I planted two “seeds” at almost the same time.
I love to create simple, easy wire projects. My goal is to take the obvious and put a unique twist on it. I make the flamework glass Double Dip components and then set about designing a unique way to use them.
I submitted the project to Step by Step this past winter. I planted the seed. It’s hard to keep a new project under wraps while it’s germinating at the magazine. But like the plant that grows and blooms, it puts the published project has grown and bloomed. It’s now happily nestled among the other projects like flowers in a garden. Ready for the readers to pick and enjoy.
Have you done any reverse gardening this past year? Did you plant the seeds earlier and now you’re seeing your creation bloom?
Comment and share your story, I’d love to hear from you! When you do share, you’ll be entered to win one of my Double Dips to use in your very own ring!
(Photo of the August issue of Step by Step Wire courtesy of Interweave’s website.)
Alice
July 10, 2010 at 12:50 pmCongratulations on being published!
I can barely keep up with just getting pieces made, and don't seem to have time to 'plant' any seeds. I'm content with that, for now. The only seed that came up was not planted by me. One of my pieces was worn in a photo shoot for the New York New York Casino in Las Vegas because the photographer saw someone wearing it. Unfortunately I didn't know about it until after the fact, so my biz name was not mentioned at all. Bummer.
Nicki
July 10, 2010 at 2:26 pmDoes it count if the seeds died? I have been submitting pieces to magazine but rarely hear back from the publishers (not even a No, thanks) – well, maybe I need a better fertilizer, so I won't give up :). Congratulations – your double dip rings are really cool.
catworx
July 10, 2010 at 3:24 pmI really liked your double dip piece when I saw it in the magazine yesterday & now, a chance to win one….WOW!!!!
I enjoyed reading your post about your seeds & the fruits they've borne, the seeds I've sewn lately have literally been that…seeds, but now myself & numerous butterflies & hummingbirds are blessed with the beauty of the wildflowers.
GailW.
July 10, 2010 at 4:21 pmNope,I've planted some seeds,but they fail to grow or I lose them.But your double dips are great!I've used them in several different ways when making jewelry.Have a great weekend!
Louise
July 10, 2010 at 5:11 pmI do't plant seeds but admire people who do. I was fascinated by the double dips when you showed them at the beginning of your journey . That they went so far is wonderful.
Elizabeth
July 10, 2010 at 10:02 pmThis is a great question. I've made a lot of polymer beads since March with no real direction, just trying new stuff. Now I have pan after pan full of wonderful projects-to-be, so I guess I did do some reverse gardening. It seems my pattern is to make, make, make and then harvest through design, design, design.
Hope I'm the lucky double dip recepient!
Elizabeth
Sabine
July 10, 2010 at 11:24 pmI have slowly gathered all the tools together and am finally producing some wonderful things. But I did take a detour today and took an inspiring lampwork class. We shall see where this takes my beadwork…
Ann
http://www.mycriticaleye.com
Dale
July 11, 2010 at 10:21 amwhile i haven't planted it yet, i'm preparing to plant the seed of setting up my own etsy shop. I'm working on getting the banner, figuring out which pieces to put up, getting good picturs (hard!)… just getting set up.
Cindy Gimbrone
July 11, 2010 at 10:51 amSome of us have planted some seeds, some of us not but each of you have made interesting comments. If you've yet to "garden" I encourage you to select something to plant and tend to it's growth. To others who have blooms, bravo! Don't forget to re-plant. It's our metaphorical gardens that keep us going. Thanks for commenting one and all!
Malin de Koning
July 11, 2010 at 4:58 pmYour double dips are wonderful. And I love the metaphore of gardening. I believe, for me, the fact that I buy a lot of beads with not always a very clear idea of what I shall do with them, I am just bulking up, is a kind of reverse gardening. The shopping is the planting. And I can have beauties laying around for quite some time before I end up actually putting them in something. Often they are part of several ideas before I make up my mind. And the final piece is the harvesting, or even better, selling it and being able to buy some new seeds to plant.
Thanks for an, as always, inspiring post.
maneki
July 11, 2010 at 8:36 pmPlanting seeds… Right now I feel I'm not planting or growing anything, but I think that the things I refer to as my "half ideas" sometimes can be seen as seeds that sometimes grow, though I use another metaphore about combining halves(borrowed from a Gyro Gearloose comic where the inventor too had creativity issues and solved them by combining half ideas in a surreal dream). So perhaps my seeds/ideas aren't growing as much as I use the seeds and sprouts in some sort of "plant breeding" or grafting, creating new hybrids and cultivars from seeds that had some good sides but could not grow well enough on their own.
(And, yes, your double dips are fab — I really like such versatile jewellery parts.)
TesoriTrovati
July 12, 2010 at 5:56 pmI am! I am finally bringing in the bounty of a harvest of the gallery exhibit. But I am still reaping and still a-sowing too! I didn't know this gardening thing would be this much work! I think I need some laborers who are willing to work for nil to help me cultivate all these art beads into flowering trees!
Enjoy the day!
Erin
Copper Diem
July 13, 2010 at 3:25 amNope, no seeds for me – but I've got my eye on next "season"
LissC
July 13, 2010 at 6:09 pmno seeds for me either, but I did want to say how very cool these double dip reversible rings are. I don't think i've seen anything like them. So very unique! It must have been hard to keep it under wraps while you waited on publication.
Congrats on that!! I've never been published, I can only imagine how exciting that is!