It was a whirlwind trip to the Bead&Button Show…a four hour drive to Milwaukee on Thursday and a repeat back home on Friday. I solely went to just do some floor show shopping and to take a class with Susan Lenart Kazmer (more about the class in my next post!). Attendance at last year’s show was down considerably…this year attendance was down even more. Several years ago there were well over 500 vendors at the show, but this year it seemed there were about half that amount. Sadly, many of the vendors who have really unique and interesting wares to sell were absent. In the past attendees were tripping over each other and sometimes one couldn’t even get close enough to see what a vendor was selling! No problem this year…you could have thrown a bowling down an aisle and not a single person would have to jump out of the way! Granted, I was only there for two days so I hope traffic picked up over the weekend when the show is open to the public. Below is my stash from the floor show…very little compared to what I brought home from previous shows.
Here are a few highlights from the Bead Dreams display on the floor show…
This colorful bead-embroidered neckpiece was created by Sherry Serafini.
“The Beauty in the Bees” neckpiece below won Best in Show for Tatiana Fitzpatrick.
Below is Amy Johnson’s “Secret Garden” bead-embroidered neckpiece.
One can only imagine the hours that went into the creation of these pieces.
And can you believe the crystal-studded Porsche shown below!
I’ll post a show and tell about my class with Susan Lenart Kazmer later!