PHOTOGRAPHY: Lisa Barth
WEBSITE: Lisa Barth Jewelry
Never forget how you
started
A Journey of Learning and Teaching others what you know
An interview with wire weaving expert Lisa Lynn Barth
By Cynthia Machata
I have wanted to interview Lisa Lynn for some
time now. I have admired all her intricate wire
weaving pieces and marveled at how masterfully she crafts these pieces. What surprised me
most about Lisa Lynn is that if you asked me
how long she’d been wire weaving I would have
said a very, very long time given her mastery of
her work, the books she’s written on the technique and the classes she teaches regularly. But
she told me that it all started at a home party
for jewelry making about 10 years ago. And
she said that she “just sat there, looking at all
the beads and wire and findings, and was so
overwhelmed and frustrated that I gave them
all back to the hostess and said, ‘Thank you but
creativebeadchat.com
I just can’t do this.’
But it seems this first look motivated Lisa Lynn
to do some independent research on her own.
“I went home and started to do some research
on the web to see what this thing called jewelry
making was all about.” She says her first piece
was a “wacky combination of strung beads
with a heavy gauge wire thing looped over the
beads, making swirls. But people loved it and
that really encouraged me to keep learning.”
Many of us can think back to when we first
started working with beads, or wire or metal.
And can remember that feeling of being a
bit intimidated with your first attempts. Lisa
Lynn says, “I remember when I was just starting