Kaleidocycles

I have been interested in making a kaleidocycle for a couple of years. I found them as a paperarts project. I printed, coloured and made a number of paper ones. But after a few weeks of they would come apart.

I knew that there had to be a way of doing it with beads. It was just triangles linked together. I tried to figure it out but was not able to get my brain around it.

The amazing beaders at Contemporary Geometric Beadwork figured it out. The instructions will be in the upcoming book CGB Pattern Book. I have pre-ordered a copy and was sent the Kaleidocycle instructions.

So I worked on making one using the colours suggested in the pattern. Basic black and white for the triangles, blue and red for the seams, yellow, green and silver for the hinges.

For my second one I decided to use the same triangle design and change the colours. So the triangles are white with one of 4 vibrant citrus colours. The seams are all white and the hinges are silver.

My most recent one again uses just one triangle design and changing colours. I went back to a favourite colour palette, the sea anemone palette, in The Beader's Color Palette by Margie Deeb. I used two of the colours on each side and the rotate thru as you flip the kaleidocycle. I did not want the seams or hinges to stand out so I used crystal AB beads.

Here are the three finished kaleidocycles. The collage show each of the four sides. The Citrus colours did not photograph very well.

I am very pleased with these. I like to sit and twist them as I watch tv. I am going to work on another variation with the sea anemone palette. I want to have all four colours on each side, just in different places in the pattern.