The Lonely Bead Project is Coming to River Wars
Originally started in the Middle Kingdom as The Bead Rescue Project, this activity aims to educated the populace about period glass beads throughout history. Beads are “hidden” at an event, waiting for some lucky person to find them and take them home. If you find a bead, it is yours to keep! However, we encourage you to come to the project table at the event to learn more about your bead, and to receive a cord so you can wear your new bead with pride.
Since River War’s represents Iron Bog’s 30th Birthday, we will be hiding 30 black and white beads at the event.
There will also be a Beadmaker’s Artisans Row at the event where interested individuals can learn more about how we recreate historic beads today.
For more information, visit our brand new website: http://lonelybeadproject.wordpress.com/, or contact Lady Elysabeth Underhill (Lissa) at laralu@gmail.com.
If you want to make beads with us at the Artisans Row, please contact Lady Naomi bat Avraham at naomi@blastedoak.com or Mistress Brunissende de Brocéliande at mathilde.poussin@gmail.com
I have a question– why has the name been changed to the Lonely Bead Project? Isn’t this the Middle Kingdom Bead Rescue Project with a new name? I thought that other kingdoms had used the same name.
Ansteorra does this under the name of Bead Rescue. I also would be interested in the reasoning.
Greetings!
Brunissende here.
I am a bit surprised that an EK newsletter is so popular but I expect it’s a good thing.
I am one of the people who were involved in the naming of this project. I am sorry if our decision has created some issues and/or hurts. That was not our intent.
Our reasoning was multiple folds:
– it is not actually the bead rescue project so it made sense (IMO) to change the name, just like the “bead rescue” project has a different name from the ISGB “release a bead” project. Our intent is to focus more on live demonstrations and interactions of the artisans, and release beads based on event-specific themes and specific findings. However, our site clearly points to the bead rescue project as a source of inspiration. We do not want to take credit for other people’s ideas.
– to convince event stewards in the East to host some tables with torches and molten glass, we need to be able to point them to in-kingdom information, and to people they know. The bead rescue project site is very much Middle Kingdom- and Northshield-centered.
http://beadrescue.com/calendar.php and http://beadrescue.com/artists.php
You, yourself, call it “Middle Kingdom Bead Rescue Project” which doesn’t give the feel of a SCA-wide project. (and yes, from the post below I understand that there is an Ansteorra clone, and probably others, but I never saw trace of it, or any kingdom other than the Middle Kingdom and Northshield on the http://beadrescue.com site). So that’s not a place we can point people from our Kingdom to.
– it seemed also practical to have a website that could be updated quickly and easily, and wordpress is a great tool for that (even _I_ am able to make some updates on it, and I am a biologist)
– having a different website with a similar name would be confusing, and so we looked for something different. We found some poetry in the idea of lost beads feeling lonely, and longing to be reunited with other beads, hence the “lonely bead” concept.
Our primary aim is to share our love of beads making and what we know of beads history with the populace. If the bead release portion of what we want to do creates issues and can’t be compatible with the “bead rescue” project because of a different name, then it will probably simpler for us to drop that altogether. It would sadden me, but that’s only one aspect of what we want to do.
Thank you for the reply!
I am Lady Rois alann inghean ui Fhlaithbheartaigh, and am the founder of The Bead Rescue Project.
There is only one point that I care to publicly address as to what has been said.
This project has NEVER been called anything but The Bead Rescue Project….It has never had the name Middle Kingdom in it at all. I reside in the Middle Kingdom, but do not and never have had the intent or authority to add that to the title or name of the project.
~ Rois
Every other kingdom has used the same name, with permission, and chosen to be part of the BRP, I would also like to hear why the decision was made to try and break off.