June 7th & 8th, 2019, at The Bead and Button Show in Milwaukee, Wisconsin
At heart, Kumihimo is a fiber art practiced for thousands of years. The adaptation to the foam disk and plate and the use of beads broadened its reach to art and fashion, but there is a limit to what an artist can accomplish without using a marudai. More complex designs require more sophisticated tools; the marudai is a critical tool towards achieving advanced techniques in your work. However, with it’s free-form design and lack of “beginning” guidelines, the marudai can be intimidating to a new user.
This 2-day class is geared towards artists who wish to explore the possibilities the marudai offers, and to take the first steps more personal, artistic, designs. The curriculum is structured towards both artists who have never used a marudai and those who have a marudai but have not realized its potential. It’s designed to allow students to work at their own speed, exploring a variety of techniques and working at whatever pace is comfortable. Working through the entire course, or staying on a particular topic are both easily achieved. The goal is to gain a sense of how the elements move and interact with each other, and to begin to develop muscle memory for the basic moves of braiding.
The curriculum will loosely follow this path:
Day One
- Introduction to the marudai: techniques and terminology
- Tama basics: attaching, leaders, weights, fiber
- Braid structures, basic movements, adding elements
- Eight element braids
- Kongoh-gumi
- Hira-yatsu
- Edo-yatsu
- Twelve element braids
- Hira-kara
- Kongo-gumi
- Sixteen element braid
- Naiki
- Eight element braids
Day Two
- Attaching tama for beaded braids
- Bead spinner basics
- 2-drop Kongoh beaded braid
- Focal beaded braids
- Reading patterns for beaded braids
- Continuous beaded braids: Hira-kara
- Beads as design elements in fiber braids
My goal during the two days is to have students spending as much time as possible braiding. The kit will include pre-set lengths of beads for the beaded braid lessons, as developing the skills to use a bead spinner can take some time. We will learn how to spin beads; each student will load one length of thread for their beaded braid.
This is NOT a projects class, but rather a techniques class. Each student will receive a comprehensive set of instructions covering all the class topics (and more), plus access to a private website for follow-up questions, video tutorials, and more.
For those students interested in taking the class who do not own or have access to a marudai, I will have a limited number available for rent, at $25 for the two days.
To register for the class, please visit http://bit.ly/tamethedai