The Zen Kat Garden is made with a technique called French beaded flowers.  Here is a brief introduction.

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"This is an art form that is many centuries old.  Very little is known for certain about it.  The art probably began during the Renaissance in the 1500's in Italy or France, who were the biggest bead producers at the time.  One popular origin story says that the peasants gathered beads leftover from embellishing gowns and strung them onto wire, then wrapped the wire to form flowers and leaves.  However, it is believed more likely that the first beaded flowers were associated with the church and worship.  Nuns made and used beaded flowers to make reliquaries and other religious artifacts.  In old English "bede" means prayer.  Bede men and women in almshouses were paid to say prayers using beads strung on wire like a rosary.  After a set of prayers were finished, the associated beads were twisted into loops, resulting in something that looked like flowers.

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The art reached it's peak in the late 1800's and 1900's when these flowers were used to make lavish funeral wreaths call Immortelles.

They were produced by workers in workhouses, then purchased from shops to display on loved one's graves.  Once the immortelles became less popular, so did the art.

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In the early to mid 1900's a shop called Bonwit and Teller in New York imported flowers made in Italy and France to sell to American customers.  The art of making flowers didn't become popular in the US until the mid 1900's when a woman named Virginia Nathanson bought one of the arrangements and took it apart to see how is was made.  She then wrote a book to teach others how to make them.

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A new era of upward trend for these flowers started in the late 1900's to early 2000.  This art has gone through many revivals and each new generation of artists develops new techniques and creative ways to use the old ones."

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When I first saw these flowers, I immediately fell in love with them. It was mind boggling what you could produce with a spool of wire and seed beads.  It took a long time to learn how to do it.  I found two ladies who had instructions and books on how to do this.

One is Fen Li with Bead Flora Studio and the other is Lauren Harpster with Bead & Blossom.  Both are fantastic teachers.  They have websites and books and instructional videos on YouTube.  They made learning this art so much easier.  I tend to combine a little from each one into my own creations.

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I love to journey to thrift shops or yard sales, looking for containers for my flowers.  It's finding that hidden treasure that will make my garden bloom.  I then use the colors in the container to pick my flowers and color patterns. 

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Welcome to our Zen Garden. 

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