I'm a backyard beekeeper and so this design has been percolating in my mind's eye for some time. When I started, I envisioned the bees to be engraved between the honeycomb, and it was nice but not really dramatic enough. This was confirmed by my friend Pam who basically said she didn't like the bees. Oh well, back to the drawing board - literally. The reason I was going to go with en engraved effect is because bees are so tiny and yet too detailed, how much detail could I add, stay in scale with the honeycomb and not have them so delicate the lantern would not be robust enough.
Some things can only be worked out through experimentation, trial and error basically but in the end, I'm pretty pleased.
Now I'm excited to share the latest addition to my Etsy shop: Honeybee Wood and Glass Hurricane lantern - my photographer (Jim - otherwise known as chief worker bee) has been working hard to capture how lovely this is. His photography skills are improving no?