Alice St.Germain-Gray , the Winner of the Winter 2001 Bead O'the Quarter

The inner core of this bead is a mixture of black, purple and amethyst. The core tube is cased with alexandrite. After shaping I added a few dashes of apple green and pink enamels. Then I added gold foil around the outside. I heated the foil gently so it would crackle apart. The intense black I used had been pulled thinner for a finer stringer line. I used a knife to put in a little ridge on each side of the stringer. My final step was to gold fume the whole deal. The fuming helped to intensify the purple and pink colors through out the bead. It also added a little more gold sheen across the bead.