about Victoria Perkins

My earliest artistic endeavors involved making sit-upons at Brownie camp.  There were the requisite art projects in grade school and the year of required high school art.  None of these activities moved me to explore a career as an artist.  But I have always been interested in color, design and composition.  

I began making beaded bracelets after taking a class from Chris Conklin-Ray in 2000.  My early pieces were pretty awful.  What the bracelets lacked in finishing, however, they made up for in the wonderful colors of vintage Czech and German glass.  Friends rewarded my efforts by purchasing this early prototype of what has evolved into my bead cuff.  Along the way I fell in love with lampwork beads and in the last year I have begun to integrate them into bracelets, necklaces and earrings.  I took a basic bracelet-making and wire-work class from Kathy Dannerback, owner of Beads and Beyond in Bellevue, Washington.  My sister Becca continues to coach me in finishing techniques.  I am grateful to each of these three women for their teaching, mentoring and support.

My bracelets have found their way into women’s personal jewelry collections all over the country.  I periodically have them in galleries such as Real Mother Goose in Portland, Oregon, Whitebird Gallery in Cannon Beach, Oregon and Vetro Gallery in San Antonio, Texas.  I have been a guest artist at LOCAL 14 and the Portland Art Musuem Holiday Show a number of times.  In addition, I do commission work.

When I began making jewelry I was constantly being asked whether I had a website.  Thanks to Vicki Moser of Coppermoon Design in Portland, Oregon, I can now say that I do.