Judith Bertoglio-Giffen is a wonder with crochet and beading. This is something I have never tried, so I am amazed at just the thought of combining the two arts of crochet and beading. She also has a terrific book out on the subject, should you be interested in this technique, it is a must have!

                

Judith was born in Springfield Illinois but grew up all over the world, where ever there was a Copper Mine. Her Dad was a mining Engineer and as a result of his job, Judith's family moved about every 2 years. Judith says she doesn't think she ever learned her times tables, but did learn to swear in several languages. She spent about 15 years altogether in Chile, and many boarding schools.

Judith earned 2 high school diplomas, one from USA and one from Chile. She went on to earn her BA in English as a second language & minor in Fine Arts from Universidad del Norte, Chile. She also spent years of Graduate University classes in Business, Materials Management & Quality Control. She also had several one-woman shows in the 1970's in Calif. with pen & ink drawings & oil paintings.

For 25 years Judith worked in the printing industry, Corporate Materials/QA Manager. After a second "downsizing" in the 90's she decided she didn't want to wear a suit & heels anymore. Judith's kids were grown and gone. Her husband's small business finally made enough to support the family so she started beading as a business. Now, she ALMOST supports herself through sales of finished beadwork & beads, teaching, B-P patterns, and now a book. One thing corporate life taught her was how to teach adults. Now she enjoys using that skill in the beading world. Working in two antique stores part time, rents and selling antiques fills in the gaps in her beading income.

Now, Judith spends half the year in Antrim NH, half the year in Tombstone AZ. When her husband passed away 2 years ago she looked around at 60 acres, a half built house & 70" of snow in NH and said..."I'm outta here in the winter". Since her 2 sisters & mother were in Southern AZ, she looked around and decided to stay there in the winter months. With the internet, beading is a very portable business and she just packs up her little red Honda Hatchback every 6 months and drives East or West!

Judith says, "I've always had a "crow" gene...love of small, shinny bright objects! I can't remember when I started beading ... I do know I was doing loom work and wire rings at about age 9 and strung beads in the 60's. Then in 1986 I bought a 25 lb box of vintage beads & findings at an auction for $15.00. That got me started stringing once again, doing necklaces to wear to work. I still treasure many of the German, Czech and Austrian beads that came in that box. Some time in the early '90's my sister Tina wanted me to bead some embroidered pieces for street fairs she was doing, so I stopped quilting, knitting socks and started beading again."

Example:

Available Patterns:
Click on an image to view the pattern.
   

Though Judith has taken very few bead classes, she has learned traditional techniques from other beaders like Edith Leone & Bev Herman at bead retreats or taking apart vintage pieces, from books, old magazines, etc. Judith has used what she learned on her own as a foundation, and says she has always designed her own work. When asked how she came to join Bead-Patterns.com, Judith replied "Rita found me and asked if she could use my free bead-crochet tutorial. I was thinking about doing a similar thing and offering patterns/instructions/kits for sale on my web site, but the more I thought of the hard work involved, the more I thought I'd let Rita do that part of it and I'd just stick to designing things to put up on B-P. The rest is history and B- P is a great place to sell what's in my mind without the headaches of the underneath work needed."

        
Beaded Crochet Rope Instructions        Beaded Crochet Rope Patterns

She goes on to say, "One cannot work in a vacuum and designing and working out what is in my head in beads and then teaching it or making an instruction set, provides a continued joy & growth. Seeing the work I've done in exploring Bead-Crochet ropes turn into a published book has to be one of the high points of my career."

Bead Crochet Ropes Book

As for anyone who has ever published for the bead industry, knows there are always challenges. For Judith this challenge was figuring out how to make a graph for bead crochet ropes that worked and that people could understand and use. Many a night she agonized over how to put on flat paper what was a 3-D helix in real life. Her family thought she was plain crazy to try & twist her brain that way!

        
Bead Crochet Rope Graph Instructions        Bead Crochet Rope Graph Paper

What inspires Judith?: "All of the variations of beading and beadwork are fodder for my creativity. From turn of the century beaded chairs, simple bead-crochet pearl ropes of the 1970's to the magnificent beaded non-wearables of today. I can learn something or get a spark of an idea from everything I see. My students teach me the most when they ask questions and I have to say, "I'd never thought of that in that way before. Let's see what happens." Her favorite design to date is the Wisteria Lariat.

Examples:
         

Available Patterns:
Click on an image to view the pattern.
   

"My ideas come from everywhere in things that I see. I walk down the street and see things that would make great beading designs. Right now I have a copy of Technology Review on my desk with an article on Nano materials... I'm thinking those gas molecule simulations would make great bead-crochet ropes! I have more ideas than I'll ever see in finished beadwork."

Bead crochet is Judith's favorite medium as it is so portable and the finished items have such a great sensuous feel to them.

Freeform Peyote is her antidote to the structured nature of bead crochet "as it seems to grow as you work on a piece - not structured at all and there are no mistakes! Bead Embroidery has to be my other love as it again allows a freedom of expression and some designs just become something else again as I work on a piece. I like things that get constructed and have lots of surface texture."

Examples:

   

Judith's workspace consists of 2 dedicated studio spaces. The one in Arizona is all bright colors with one wall of white shelves for her traveling beads. The one in NH is pie shaped and is actually the entrance to her apartment. It is full of traditional oak furniture with bookcases for her beads to live in. It took her most of a year to figure out how to organize and store her growing bead stash so that it could travel with her. She says that only about 80% goes with her, but flip-top containers that fit into Plano boxes that fit into canvas totes seems to be the perfect solution.

        
Arizona Storage                                                    New Hampshire Studio

Judith's plans for the future include more teaching and workshops because for her, the interaction with students is what adds to her growth as a bead artist. There are two more books on bead crochet in the planning stages. She is also working with two people on a marketing plan for her finished beadwork, the bread & butter source of income would allow her more freedom to bead, design and travel.

Judith says that the biggest accomplishment in her life has been to raise two great children to adulthood and have both of them become her best friends. The biggest challenge has been losing her husband and best friend of 35 years to a sudden heart attack before retirement and having to pick up the pieces, rearrange and re-think the rest of her life in individual goals.

Judith's thoughts on beading:
"Beading allows me a freedom of expression, by design or otherwise, to create jewelry that enhances a person's personal statement. I take pleasure in making adornments that delight both the wearer and viewer."
 
"I employ traditional techniques that project a sensory stimulus in the glittering light of beads. Bead by bead, stitch by stitch, each piece is unique. Beads satisfy my hunger for color and texture where the journey of creation is as important as the finished piece."

Examples:
   

Available Pattern:
Click on an image to view the pattern.