Kalaya Steede

Hope everyone is managing to stay cool.   It is so hot outside even the mosquitoes are staying indoors and they had me for breakfast! Last weekend Thomas Mann's  studioFLUX  hosted Richard Salley .  What a great surprise when I found out Richard was going to be here in NOLA!  I have been wanting to take a workshop with him since FOREVER. It was a two day workshop about making a locket cuff.   So what did I do?   Got to see old friends... and make new ones... and made a couple of tools.   Which was totally cool!   I like making tools but I think you guys know that already.  Mr. Pointy was a scribe and then there is the bezel pusher/burnisher.  Fun to have your own tools that you make to work with. Here is my messy bench.  Everything had been etched, textured, punched, and hinged.  Putting it together is all that was left. Voilà  It was a locket for the man who had ins...

Bonjour!  Lately I have been thinking about making a belt buckle for myself.   I do not know why.  It is not like I wear my shirts tucked in or anything!  But it would be nice to have a REALLY cool buckle! So when I saw this fantastic piece by artist Jesse Bert I just HAD to share!   Photo by Jesse Bert   Come on...take a close look!  Check out those pointy ends.  Have you ever seen anything like it?  I mean the boots that is.  I hear it is the trend in northern Mexico and started in Dallas of all places!  The boots are known as botas vaqueras  exóticas .  Apparently these are worn at night clubs and anywhere one wants to make a statement. Oops...I digress...anyway the botas vaqueras exóticas was the inspiration behind the piece shown above.  Also included was this iron grate, as Jesse describes "...wonderful iron grate I found on the ground in a village of the mountains of Oaxaca.  I crea...

There is nothing to do and nowhere to go. Accepting this, we can do everything and go anywhere. In NOLA June is the start of hurricane season, kids, snowballs, kids, summer rain, kids, festivals, and KIDS!!!  Kids are everywhere!  Even in my house!  Hey...how did they get there? Better yet...how did I get here?  Ha! June has been the month of change for me.  So many different things to accept and to let go.  Needless to say I have not been able to do a thing in the studio.  Which is making me pretty crabby.  Argh!!!    I was able to be alone in the studio this past weekend and had no idea what to do.  So I just sat there looking at stuff.  Moving things from here to there not accomplishing much of anything. One thing that has been lurking in my mind is this burning desire to make a journal using coptic binding.  Why?  So I can open that baby up 360 degrees and use my most absolute FAV paper...Fabri...

Ahh...June...the days of summer has begun.  It is pretty hot here in New Orleans but I am sure it can be hotter and not to worry because it will be in August.  And that IS the hottest month of the summer. hehe! Lately I have not been able to work in the studio but ideas are running around inside my brain.  They need to get out and soon! So what have I been doing? Well...I have been teaching a couple of leather wrap bracelet workshops here in New Orleans at The Bead Shop . My latest workshop involved (to my surprise) four VERY young ladies.  They must of been my youngest students yet! I was pretty impressed on their abilities to pick their own color of beads, leather, and end bead.  The colors came out so beautifully!  I think they are designers in the making.   While teaching them they mentioned something pretty interesting.  They told me about receiving bead kits as gifts but what to do with them?  Then they sai...