Wednesday, August 28, 2013

1996 Revisited

Hello Beady Friends,

    Its end of summer, been too long since my last blog, not that i lack a Facebook post or three, and time for some beady reflection. Seventeen years ago i got married, and among all the family struggles organizing the
event, I took on back to back talks, lectures, therapy sessions :-) at the New Jersey Bead Society http://www.beadsocietyofnewjersey.org/index.html and the Bead Society of New York http://www.nybead.org/. Well its deja vu  all over again, and no i am not getting married :-)

   September 19th 2013, I  will be taking  the bead bus to New Jersey and the 25th will be speaking at the big auditorium at the Fashion Institute of Technology. That being said, i ask myself how did i get here. With the wedding on the agenda and and a more bustling fashion market my senses were at a height and so was my bead babble. Still today i question, really do i have anything to say. I started in the business June 1987, with a good education and memories of a childhood in beads. As far as beads and business go, its funny how money does  come into play, totally different to your youth, where the memories are more select, like meeting Jay Strongwater on my summer job or falling in love with the boxes of Millefiori trade beads piled in a corner office. After graduation i got to go to Czechoslovakia for the first time, save money for my first apartment, in the city, and developed the urge  to impress my dad who paid for my education(with beads you can say). Beads are a serious business for me now.

  I have a eleven year old and a 35th street apartment in walking distance to the shop, yes i have a mortgage, financial worries but i also have had a life in beads and a perspective that may be different than most. I do not raw or craw, have played chutes and ladders, no brick necessary,  i do not solder, or do wire wrapping yet i feel i have something to say. I can date a beads production's era, understand the evolution of a trade bead but since i am a importer and have seen things from both the European and American sides i can influence the shaping of what new beads are in development and the coatings that should be applied.

  By no means have i reinvented the wheel. Most of my inspiration comes from the past and the artists i am fortunate enough to work with. I could say our company was the first to have the fire polish roundels which are now flooding the market from China and Czech or that I invented the Czech spike bead, yet cavemen used spikes, there are also gumdrops and aged stripes, regardless everyone of these items i visually saw in some way prior to their availability. That is the key i think. Visual senses develop from experience and i am approaching my 48th year and with a quarter century in the business i may see something others do not that are needed in our marketplace. Its these senses that make me want to collect beads, continue exploring the potential in new bead production and want to work with other artists and enthusiasts. Hope we can share these experiences next month or check me out on facebook, https://www.facebook.com/PBeads, beads are a wonderful commodity, they age and evolve each day like we do and keep my eyes acute and my fingers posting :-)

See ya soon,

Perry

Perry.