The quest for the Holy Grail.......

I've been working in a special glass colour chart resource for about 10 months or so now. It's a very kitsch and geeky Alphabetical Chart of (CiM) CoE 104 glass colours. To the left here is just a small section of the chart as it stands today, this is just the S section.....all in all there are 163 beads.
Every bead has it's name doodled on it in glass too.

Algae Mushie

When I started this project I wasn't sure that the chart would ever become a complete representation of every glass that CiM have ever produced as some of the older colours are out of production.

I made the decision quite early on to exclude the colour variations labelled as "uniques" partly because they would all just get filed under "U" and partly because I have always liked the way that CiM have given their glass special names that conjure up a mental image of the shade, Freman, Clockwork, Crocus, Army Men.....utterly appealing :-D

Sunshine Mushie

Creation is Messy began production of CoE 104 glass for bead making back in 2006, a year or so before I even began lampworking.  Even so, because CiM take great care to maintain colour consistency within their regular line, I have been able to source some of the earliest colours from later melts.

Between my own stash, colours I'd been sent for testing and the lovely CiM shopping spree prize sponsored by Off Mandrel for coming second in Beads & Beyond Jewellery Maker of The Year competition (lampwork) last summer, I was well on the way to pulling the glass together for this project. Four colours remained completely elusive though, Algae, Sunshine, Tabby Grey and Dusk.

Tabby Grey

Just a couple of weeks ago I received the loveliest gift from JamieLynn who runs Howaco Glass in the U.S, and her friends. When my friend Sue showed JamieLynn the colour chart project on Craft Pimp she had a good look round her studio and also put out the word about the chart and that I was missing these colours. Amazingly she managed to find them all!

Dusk Mushie

When I wrote to thank JamieLynn she told me....The four colors actually came from four different people, each of them just had the one color and no one else had any of the colors, so I do believe it was ment to be.

I am so grateful  for the kindness of these five lovely ladies who have made the impossible possible.

With the addition of these four colours, at this very moment my CiM Colour chart is completely up to date.....though I did just spot the next collection of ltd run glass on the CiM Artists Preview Page. Am looking forward to having a play with those, Aloe Juice looks particularly appealing.

Jolene xx