Wednesday, March 26, 2008

Can't believe they're made of beads?

Everything from huge flowers to tiny hummingbirds can be produced from bits of color

Clara Garcia News-Bulletin Staff Writer; cgarcia@news-bulletin.com

Bosque Farms When Lodi Ake first began beading more than 10 years ago, she never thought that the art would ever become anything more than a hobby, much less her passion.

But the Bosque Farms artist has transformed her life through countless strings and beads, and giving others a taste of what has changed her life. Today, Ake owns her own shop, Lodi's Beads, and offers classes to those who share her passion.

From the simplest designs strung together in multicolored fashion to the more intricate motifs united with a more embellished experience, Ake's beadwork is inspiring.

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Beadwork is the art or craft of attaching beads to one another or to cloth using a needle and thread. Most beadwork takes the form of jewelry or other personal adornment, but beads are also used in wall hangings and sculpture.

Beadwork techniques are broadly divided into loom and off-loom weaving, stringing, bead embroidery, bead crochet, and bead knitting, Ake said.

With a variety of different types, colors, and textures of beads in her Bosque Farms store, Ake recently moved to a new shop, just across the street from her original location, where she has more space. Now, there's more room for her beads, for her strings, for the artwork, and for her students.

Ake began dabbling in beadwork in 1996 when an acquaintance who thought she had experience in the art had asked for her help on a project.

"I had done a lot of other things, counted cross-stitch and other craft-type projects," Ake says. "I told her that I didn't know how to do what she doing, but I knew someone that could help her."

The next time that Ake saw this woman, she was asked to join the beading group that she was attending once a week. When Ake went to the group, which was in the midst of doing a more advanced project than she expected, she told them that she didn't think she would be going back.

"It just looked too stressful to me — working all those tiny little beads," Ake said. "It was too much detail. I had a high-stress job, and I thought it would be adding more stress to keep up with all the colors and patterns."

Needless to say, Ake's concern didn't last long, and she learned that the opposite was true and kept going.

"It was very relaxing, very therapeutic," she said. "The color was very fun, and the textures were a challenge. I enjoyed it so much that I wanted to do more and learn everything I could. I think beading teaches patience."

Ake said she beads because it makes her happy. She loves the creative process, thinking about what she's am going to do, selecting the colors, laying out all the beads and supplies, getting started, figuring out how to get the combination of colors and textures to work together — the challenge, the anticipation.

"The feeling of accomplishment when the piece is finished is very gratifying," she said. "It's relaxing, and the best part is I'm enjoying wonderful friendships with people I would have never found if it were not for beading."

As Ake continued to work and perfect her beadwork, she met another woman who suggested that she open a shop in Valencia County. Working as a manager in the insurance industry for two decades, Ake was excited about the prospect of opening her own store.

What began as a hobby turned into a part-time adventure when Ake opened up her first shop on Wednesday evenings and on the weekends. In that time, Ake had done enough projects that she got permission from beadwork designers to teach their projects.

After six months, Ake left her job, took another part-time position and began to focus more on her shop. Eventually, Ake quit the insurance business in 1999 altogether, focusing her attention on her artwork and her business. In the almost 10 years of doing this, Ake has had to expand her space three times to accommodate the activity here.

"My pursuit of the art of beading now centers around the activity that takes place here," Ake said. "It's very natural when you learn something and people ask you about it and they want to learn; it's very easy to share that. I had been in my profession for 21 years, and I was burned out. It was the passion for the beading — I had to make it work because it's what I wanted and what I love."

In the years since opening Lodi's Beads fulltime, Ake's business has not only thrived, but the number of classes she offers has more than tripled.

"My students who first came to me, some already knew how to bead, and they were people who I took classes with and were as good or better at the art than I was," she said. "They would start buying from me and take other classes.

"The new students, who would just come in, they would say they drove by and were curious," she said. "They would come in and would have a dazed look when they walked in. It's a visual overload when they see all the color."

Ake will start beginning beaders focusing on a stitch or a technique including beading on a loom. She will teach them how to read a pattern, finish off the threads, attach it to a metal barrett and then how to apply the backing and finish it off. And if the student wants to move on with the loom, the next project may be a bracelet.

Ake's introduction to beading, which teaches the loom technique, also instructs students different stitches, including the appliqué stitch, which is how to bead around a stone and how to apply it to a pinback or a necklace.

"We also teach the peyote stitch on a key chain," Ake said. "Those are basic teaches that you can progress into bigger projects and you can combine the stitches to make your project."

With dozens of different types of stitches and hundreds of different kinds and colors of beads, Ake said anything is possible.

"What we do here is we focus on a different stitch every month and set up a class based on that particular stitch," Ake said. "We just want people to come in and try something new. Because it's our stitch of the month, we have a beginner project, an intermediate project and an advanced project for that stitch so we can appeal to everyone that's interested."

Ake also offers a flower of the month project, a holiday-themed class, a friends and family workshop that is offered on a two-for-one special, a mystery workshop, and Friday Friendzy workshop. Guest instructors also present workshops at Lodi's Beads.

"Beading is actually very addictive," Ake said. "We have people of all ages who come in. We have something for everyone. The more people who come, the more projects we need to have for them to do. And when they come, they are not only learning a technique or a combination of techniques to create a beautiful work of art, they are making new friends, encouraging and inspiring each other, sharing ideas, and finding parts of themselves that they never knew existed."

Ake said she thinks the reason it works is that when we make beautiful things with beautiful beads, others notice and become curious and want to learn to do it too.

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