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Perfect for Valentines Day – or any day for that matter because who doesn’t love a big fabulous glass heart!
I just saw my necklace featured in the latest Giftware News Magazine From the Heart Section. It is always a thrill to see your work displayed in print and I am honored to be included with such a lovely selection of gifts.
I have been working with wholesale clients since I did my first show in San Francisco in 2004. Because my jewelry features the highest quality glass beads handmade in Venice and Murano, I have been featured in some wonderful museums including The Field Museum, The National Gallery of Art and The Frye Museum. I also have several boutiques and gift shops that I have worked with for a number of years including Delaney Street Mercantile in Lake Geneva, WI.
My jewelry is not trendy, it is classic and elegant just like Italy. Yet I always carry the latest in bead designs and colors from the most skilled Venetian bead makers. All of my jewelry pieces are handmade in my California studio in the Santa Cruz Mountains. All Pendants come on slip knotted leather cords and on display cards which tell the story of Venetian glass bead making. Perfect for gift giving. Please check out my Etsy shop to see a sampling of my current offerings.
If you are interested in consideration as a retailer for Dolce Beada, please feel free to contact me at angelakeller(at)dolcebeada.com, I would love to talk with you about the possibilities.
Ciao,
Angela
Okay, I think I have found my new hobby – not that I have time for a hobby ;-). This pair of earrings was project #2 in my bead embroidery exploration. This technique is so much fun! It is very free form and you just kind of go where it takes you.
I started with a Venetian bead cabachon that I glued down to the backing and then did a peyote stitch around it to “secure” it. From that point it just becomes a matter of choosing various size beads and finding a pattern that is pleasing to the eye. I love the varying texture that comes from the different beads. A fish hook style earwire is attached to the back and then covered in ultrasuede making the whole backing very neat.
I think I enjoy this technique so much because it is basically hand sewing beads and reminds me of quilting. My first job was in a small quilting shop and all of my great grandmothers were prolific quilters. This pair of earrings probably took me about 6-7 hours! I completed them in a couple of very late nights while my husband was out of town.
Stay tuned for my next endeavor!
Now featured in Hey Handmade!
Hey Handmade is on a mission to encourage people to buy handmade this holiday season. With that in mind Timothy Adam has produced an e-catalog with a variety of handmade items. You can find unique jewelry, clothing accessories and home decor just to name a few.
Express your love with these small Venetian glass heart earrings. The color is fantastic! Gold foil is encased in red glass giving this pair of earrings a rich ruby red coloring. They dangle from sterling silver fish hook earwires for a simple yet elegant look. Many other colors available as well. Check it out on my Etsy shop or contact me to request a color.
I was working on this post earlier and it was just too bland – then a funny thing happened as I was driving home. I don’t normally drive in rush hour traffic but I was on the highway and it was beginning to get dark and it’s bumper to bumper and this man pulls up next to me and starts waving his arm around at me . So naturally I think he’s a freak or he just doesn’t like my driving so I ignore him and pull away. Well he ends up next to me again and still he had his window down and he’s pointing at my car and waving his arm around. Oh my gosh, what’s wrong with this weirdo, right – oh wait, he’s trying to tell me that my lights are not on! Okay, I would have figured this out eventually, but he has saved me some grief and now he is not a weirdo, he is my friend.
And that’s what my post is about. As a sole proprietor of a small business I am always going it alone and trying to stay focused on what needs to happen next. And sometimes it’s a lot of things! Especially at this time of year because I am gearing up for the holiday season. This means I am making lots of pieces 
some new designs but also many of my most popular items as well to get ready for upcoming shows. I am also shipping orders to my retailers such as Delaney Street Mercantile and working on my online presence at my Etsy shop.
So I’ve got lots of things going and sometimes it is hard to stay on track – kind of like driving with my lights off! So this year I have enlisted a couple of new friends to remind me to turn on my lights and stay on track.
I have enlisted myself in Etsy’s Holiday Boot Camp and it has been great. They have a checklist every week to get ready for the holidays and then my 2 excellent buddies SSMDesigns and ThoroughlyModernMommy and I check in every week to make sure we are doing what we are supposed to do. So far as a result of boot camp I have greatly improved my photos and the look of my Etsy shop and I am up to 90 listings now. My goal is 100 by Saturday. Almost there Woo hoo.
I have also signed up with Tara Gentile to work on merging my website and my blog so I can communicate with you in a more cohesive manner – or something like that. The plan is that you will see how that goes by December.
So bottom line, sometimes you think you are cruising along okay but you realize that maybe you could use a little input from some outside sources to keep you on track.
I just placed an order for sterling silver components. How quickly $1000 can slip through your hands!
One of the many lessons I have learned in this jewelry making business of mine is that I have to stay on top of my inventory. Between the Venetian Glass Beads and the sterling silver components, the supplies that I use in Dolce Beada are pretty expensive. Whether it be the supplies or the finished product, if I don’t know what I have already I end up spending a lot of money unnecessarily. And I have had to learn this lesson the hard way. For example last week I discovered that I have 1000 2″ sterling silver headpins – that’s probably 3 years worth – just sitting here. Oops, how did that happen. When I order supplies, I try to think of my supplies as money – I wouldn’t leave $1000 just sitting under my desk right?? So I try not to over do it when I place that order. The other thing I really try to be careful about is that I am really ordering the component that I need. There is nothing worse than ordering a bead for a specific project and then discovering you ordered it in the wrong size!
I think it mainly comes down to being organized. When I have a place for everything, it is much easier to see when and what I need to reorder. The other thing that I did a few years ago was to put all of my inventory on Quickbooks. This was an extremely tedious process but it has definitely helped me to track what I have and also how much each piece of jewelry costs.
Now, perhaps I should clean up my desk – I may unearth some more treasures I have forgotten about.
Dolce Beada, my sweet life in beads 