Mixed-Media Bracelets?

So lately I've been thinking (and the thought won't leave my mind) -- I rarely wear bracelets anymore (except for my awesome geisha charm bracelet that I traded to a customer for some item descriptions), because I spend my day writing and typing and digging in the dirt and it's a very rare bracelet that doesn't impede my work. However, I love the look of a big, rattly, gorgeous bracelet (not a cuff, a bracelet-bracelet).

I also have a whole lot of single-strand bracelets that I've made to sell from a bowl at shows ... and have never sold a single one in person.


Lots of 5 at a great low price available here.

Since those are adjustable bracelets made with nice beads, here's my plan: I'll add one to three strands to the original (parallel, wrapped, or braided), then secure a cluster of unbreakable/break-resistant charms, buttons, and beads to the lobster clasp so that both sides (strands and clasp) can serve as a focal element.

Some methods I'd like to try:

1. Braiding some of my massive overstock of vintage pendant chain to make up a strand (this may be too stiff; we'll see).
2. Strips of cloth/lace/ribbon secured to a base cord with a wrapping of fine wire, as shown in winter's Belle Armoire Jewelry.
3. Leather cord -- which I've never done a thing with, ever, and feel a vague responsibility to try.
4. A wirework element making up one strand.
5. Interactive elements, like sliding beads and similar worry stones.
6. Handmade wire chain (another Belle Armoire project I've been itching to try).
7. A chain made of two-hole buttons (which shouldn't be too fragile if it's not especially load-bearing).

A Little Grin

In the description for the earrings below, I actually used the one really cool thing I learned from the Etsy writing workshop: Using a quick, unusual story to explain damage to a vintage item.



Sold!

To wit: "The two large pearl beads have slightly different shades and imperfections (I like to imagine it comes of their being worn by a dangerous gang of flapper girls for a famous faux pearl heist), but this is barely visible and what can be seen only enhances the vintage feel of the earrings."


It's always nice when something you wrote makes you smile a little later on.  I got this feeling from the descriptions of some of the stick incenses for my current Elance client, too.  It's a high, like suddenly realizing that the beads are falling into an additional pattern you didn't even plan but which is perfect.  Flipping over a pancake to find you've judged just right and it's wholly fluffy, and melt-in-your-mouth gold.  Or perfectly executing a martial arts form.

A necklace I wanted to talk a little more about

Available here.

I named this necklace Arc of Ages, which is supposed to be a cleverish allusion to Rock of Ages (still a'rollin, rock of ages ...).  We got the vintage (I date it to the 1970s based on style) necklace base from Grandma's Antiques and Things, a fantastic little store run out of a garage in Pendleton which has become my primary steampunkerie supplier (the octogenarian proprietor is really having trouble figuring out what those nice girls are doing with all that weird hardware).

What I wanted to point out, because my blog, not my item descriptions, is the place for annoying self-congratulation, is the rather coherent symbolism that forms in the strange combination of materials here.  (Note that M deserves the majority of the credit for this.)  The large watch face, of course, aligns it with the sf-clockwork look.  The rectangular shield has an odd, delightful filigree pattern reminiscent of a somewhat mechanized paisley -- and of course, nothing is more neo-historical than shamelessly appropriating the motifs of other cultures (see here.)  The arrangement of the subtle gears (really, they're barely visible in person, the light picking them up for an instant before they vanish for a moment in the harmonized chaos of the design) arcs gracefully around the watch face like an event horizon.  Also suggesting the passage of time and the "message of ancient days," as the sole quote I know from Cicero pontificates, is the centerpiece of the watch face: an antiqued silvertone pewter connector in the shape of a Celtic knot, representing infinity.

Multicultural, neo-Victorian, time-traveller-esque -- I think I found steampunk, honey!  Two different thicknesses of triple-link cable chain (vintage) complete the necklace in a statement-goddess-waterfall shape.

I'm also proud of the rather slick wirework on the piece.  See the back:

Most inspiring drinky things

So, do you think the folks at the Jelly Shot Test Kitchen would mind if I turned everything they've ever photographed into a pair of earrings or a pendant?


Admire these fruity beauties!  The depth of field in this photo is just stunningly handled.  The gorgeously casual, utterly perfect tumbled look could probably be replicated with various sizes of Swarovski Cosmic Freeform Diamonds, dice beads and Simplicity cut beads:






The fruity shades and the very organic look of the skewers in these Watermelon Basil Martini Jelly Shots could be replicated with a stack of varying shapes of frosted resin and polymer clay, plus a messy, twisted spiral headpin in plastic-coated or nylon-coated wire.


These are their mimosa shots, glossy and tempting in this well-styled photo, and the minute I saw them, I thought that I could mimic that exactly with ball-end headpins worked into spirals (or, heck, just wire) supporting a stack of three lentil-shaped beads, maybe a lemon quartz or a nice glass, spaced with squares of thin yellow fabric.

The glory that was Rome

A necklace heavily inspired by Gradiva, the novella by Wilhelm Jensen based on a Roman bas-relief; the artwork and book jointly inspired some of Freud's ideas about fetish and a Dali painting.

Here's my interpretation:

Available here.

The cameo is a vintage glazed ceramic piece I've had for donkey's years, worked into one of my nest-type bezels.  When I'm making those I'm always convinced they're not working, but they almost always do ...  The wirework on the chain is not just decorative, but secures the connections between the chain and the beading in a graceful, textural manner.

Cameos are an old art form.  In the pre-industrial age, cameos were not the molded-resin pretties we are familiar with today, but were hand-carved from ivory, shell or stones.  There is some (possibly apocryphal) record of Alexander the Great presenting his Persian lover, Bagoas, with a ring containing a portrait cameo of himself carved in chalcedony.  You can still find some natural-material cameos, like these black lip shell examples, but hand-carved ones are rarer than ever.
More on cameos, plus multiculturalism in Victorian accessories, on Monday!

Home decor of nerdy glee

This warms the cockles of my heart and makes my hand twitch instinctively toward the Mod Podge:


Image courtesy Jennifer Ofenstein.

Isn't that incredibly cool?  I am thinking of perhaps a desk nook done in Victorian naturalist texts, damaged Audobon guides, cryptozoology sketches, with pressed leaves and flowers added for more color and texture.  It would be glorious.

The same person does awesome paper-piecing patterns: Here's a great little tutorial on using them for greeting cards.

Mixed media, Fiber jewelry, Strawberries, M

Image copyright Fanciful Devices.

These are awesome and cool and make me want to do a lot more fiber.

They initially appealed because M loves strawberry stuff, but I'm not sufficiently ironic and hip to not cringe at the little Indian (the artist is Uruguayan, and doesn't have my guilt issues on the subject).  Then I became enchanted by the use of the appliques.  Maybe they could be ironed onto fabric and cut out?

By the way, I bought some awesome enameled bells for M from this seller; impressively swift shipping!  I got some chihuahua bells and some strawberry ones, which were sold with this lovely lovely style shot:

The transition there was strawberries.  Yeah.  Now hold onto your powdered wigs, ladies and gents, I'm making a sharp U-turn back to fiber.

I have some cabochons which are clear acrylic and magnify what's underneath, and I'm considering going through M's and my (mostly her) quilting fabric stash for small patterns that would look nice under a fisheye magnification.  I think this might be a nice, easy, lower-priced assembly project, maybe with a little beading -- I really am starting to work at a level I need to charge higher prices for, so it would be good to have a lower-end point-of-sale or niece-gift product which doesn't scream, "I'm reselling pot metal shaped by small children in Malaysia or Hong Kong!"  (Actually, Hong Kong is supposed to be tightening up regulations, last I heard.  Snaps for Hong Kong if this is the case.)

Fiber.  Strawberries.

I used hemp and polyester ribbon in this one:

Available here.

TERRIBLE light.  Dear God, I need to retake those.
Yeah, this post is not remotely topical.

Colorways

Sometime in the last few months I read an article or blog post, which I cannot now locate, in which a jewelry artist mentioned having found a thrift-store copy of a book called something like Color Combinations for Oil Painters which she regularly used in her design process.

Longtime readers will be able to predict that I was a little mystified by this for a moment, because I am a Bad Artist, or at any rate one who apparently functions a little differently from most.  After some thinking, I realized that most of this is a result of my style: I generally construct around a focal, so the combination of colors I should use is in front of me and it's a simple matter of finding surrounding shades -- I can't remember the technical name for them; the shade and tint or highlight/lowlight of a particular hue, and I know there's a name for that.  It's like if I had a focal that was orange and leaf green I would select beads in blood orange and canteloupe, forest and mint to set it off nicely.

Anyway.  Even when I'm doing without focals or creating my own, I generally work from a "character" or a "concept" or a "story" (I am leery of these terms, and thus place them in scare quotes) rather than a color combination.  I make jewelry for the characters in manga I read, I dream up jewelry to go with suggested wedding themes in design blogs I run across, I pick leftover beads out of the cups in my bead board and make something with those to avoid sorting them back, I imagine my earrings based on the hairstyle they'd suit or what color M has complained about not having enough of lately.  I can come to the bead board thinking "Okay, aqua, brown and olive," as I did with this (older) piece:



But that's a challenge.  I suppose that means I should be doing it more.  But it's much more natural for me to start picking stuff out while my brain repeats "a dragonfly that landed in a glass of iced lemonade" (yes, really; I didn't have enough crystalline yellows for that one to work) or "Mempis city rain" or "that minute when they first come into Rivendell in The Fellowship of the Ring."  This is really just another part of my love affair with words: Color names are more inspiring to me than color shades.

If there happens to be any other designer like me, I have found this a handy resource: Randall Munroe's color survey worked out how people name various web colors -- sorted by colorblindness and sex-at-birth.

Other than that, I resolve that sometime this month I am going to take one of those jewelry color-choice tools and actually use it for an actual piece of jewelry.  So there, brain.

So there.

Tutorial: Wire-Wrapped Earrings

I figured I might as well do a free jewelry tutorial at some point, so why not the wire-wrapped bridal earrings from February?  They're a lovely simple, graceful, infinitely customizable design that can be made more or less casual.  And maybe I can get the photo onto Craftgawker (unlikely; they like their straight-on hero shots at Craftgawker, though it's much easier to be vetted in now, either because I've improved more than I realize or because they're no longer permitting Etsy post photos so there's drastically less competition).

Anyhow.

Free Handmade Jewelry Tutorial: How to Make Hand-Brushed Wire-Wrapped Earrings
suitable for bridal, formal or casual wear, with a subtle 14k brushed gold finish.

You will need:
- 8 inches (or so) 21g 14k gold-filled wire, dead soft
- 2 round 10mm beads
- 2 contrasting round 6mm beads
- 1 pair gold-filled earwires

- flush cutters
- round-nose pliers
- chain-nose pliers
- sanding block
-nylon-jawed pliers

The sanding block can be acquired inexpensively at your local hardware store.  As for the rest, get the good stuff.  Instructions after the jump.

Mixed Media and Urban Decay

Just wanted to share about a picture from one of my favorite fellow sellers, Fanciful Devices:


Photo copyright Fanciful Devices.

That's a filigree that she's glued paper to -- apparently at the expense of her floor -- she says it was quite stiff.  But I wonder, if one papier-mached and then top-sealed newspaper instead of standard print ... possibly over one of those wire frames which one has ruined in plier overenthusiasm but has not the heart to be rid of ...

I also love how that artist uses cameos: infrequently, but without feeling bound to make them girly when she does.

Further eye candy of urban decay and material culture: We Sell Used Gods.  Further further eye candy of urban decay and material culture: 99 Rooms. 

Have some time, and maybe some earbuds, handy before you click that latter.  You'll want them.  It's insanely cool and deserves half an hour of your full attention.

(oh crap I just realized I left the bread dough on the counter overnight and now I'm at work and I can't save it.  I guess that's one way to use up whole wheat flour that doesn't quite work in the recipe ...)

I dream in black and burgundy

My customer's wedding was at the end of February, so time to show off the jewelry I made for her party!

Her earrings, wire-wrapped 14k gold fill with a hand-brushed finish.  I'd never actually done a brushed finish, so I allowed myself an hour or two to devote to learning the technique on inexpensive wire, and purchased a nice fine wire brush and file set.  I soon discovered that: (a.) it's really easy, and (b.) five minutes and a sanding block works better and looks better.  We live and learn.



I'm contemplating making up a tutorial for those.  Look for it at the beginning of April!

The bracelets were three-strand Bordeaux Swarovski pearl and black onyx with pewter toggle clasps and silver-plated charms made of crystal pearls with bead caps.
Lessons learned here:
(a.) Get the wrist measurements before ordering the supplies -- I think this customer may have gone handmade partly because she couldn't find anything ready-made to fit her very small bridesmaids.  I have a bunch of extra pearls.  But this is okay because I also learned:
(b.) Allow "wiggle room" in your pricing for stuff to sell out two minutes before you place your order.  That is not the originally planned clasp.  And I had to get the 6mm pearls much more expensively from Beadaholique when Fire Mountain Gems sold out of them since they were having a sale.
The clasp: an adventure.  I highly recommend this shop and this one for supplies; neither of them were selling multiples of the clasp, but they were both very prompt in telling me so!

I couldn't resist doing "vintage" styled shots of the jewelry.  This is the "winter" version, styled with browned leaves of flowering kale -- I desaturated, soft-focused and upped the dynamic color range for a sense of time and nostalgia:



And here's the "warmer" version, half-sepia-filtered, graduated-tinted, and soft-focused after styled with a litter of the deadheads from my apricot violas, for a sense of nostalgia, the warm blush of the beautiful and impermanent:


Pruning makes for great props. Also, I definitely want to do some more sanding of metal for the nice matte finish. 

The total of the jewelry was five bracelets and a pair of earrings: all in all, a good-sized commission, though if I hadn't been custom-sizing each one and thus redesigning a little, I'd have naturally gone stark raving mad on bracelet four.  But as it was, getting the same design with varying wrist sizes was an interesting challenge.  Much fun!

Meditation upon Chandeliers

Surely someone must wear chandelier earrings these days.  Right?

Chandelier earrings have seemed since I started my Etsy shop to just be not worth the effort.  They consistently get lower views than similarly tagged earrings in other styles, I've never sold a pair, and they are actually harder and more repetitive to make than even many-tiered drops.


Available here.

The wholesaler I use is having a sale on a bunch of Swarovski stuff and I ordered some of their silver-plated pewter findings, but found myself hesitating over the chandelier findings.  "Chelsea," I said to myself, "these are the best deal they have.  Chandelier plus post plus clutch.  If you're trying to get the most for your money this is what you should be doing."

Then I said to myself, "But it's foolish to throw good money after bad getting things that won't sell.  And the likelihood of someone requesting a pair of chandelier earrings, let alone a single pair in the specific color you're getting, is apparently slim."

Then I said to myself, "I need to stop talking to myself.  It alarms Megan if I do it too often or earnestly."

So really, which is worse?  Passing up a pretty good opportunity to get discount supplies -- or getting supplies that I know are slow sellers?

The pair above was for the wedding collection, mind you, and wedding jewelry sort of across the board seems to be largely the same stuff so I felt obligated to have some "classic" boring pieces.  I don't think they're especially boring, though, and I'm really proud of the photo, where the slightly darker clay sets off the rainbow effect of the AB crystal quite well for this neat sort of carnival effect.  Still, they were meant as a complement, not a showpiece.  This pair was more intended for actual, y'know, coolness, sort of a Steampunk Atlantean feel:



Available here.

Possibly the slow selling is because people are highly aware that anonymous chandelier earrings are a staple of the cheap import fashion jewelry market and the look can be gotten for a lot less -- for which I can't blame people at all.  It's a little ludicrous to try to compete with dollar-a-pair outfits at their own game, and the look has to be significantly different for jewelry to not be a futile market.  The look has to be different (unexpected bead and finding choices); the quality has to be higher (I wire-wrap the elements together, because that's a whole lot of a small, fine-gauge jump rings to put so much trust in and wire-wrapping is much more secure).

I did take the trouble to list another set this week, because I've had these forty-year-old curtain rings in my hardware box for ages, then found that it is remarkable how much grey transparent glass will take on the tones of the metal it's nearest:

Available here.

Still, ones like the second photo seem like they ought to be going better than they do ... which leads me back to my original question.  Is it just that I'm the only one who wears chandelier earrings anymore?

Style contemplations once again!

Today, I was setting out to do something with my shop announcement on Etsy that would give people some framework to experience the stuff I make.  As I'm sure I've said before, my style is sort of all over the place and you have to view a couple dozen pieces before you see the common threads.

I wound up with "Here you'll find handmade jewelry in an eclectic style that includes organic freehand wirework, found objects and (mostly) symmetrical glass-bead designs. Steampunk assemblage and bright vintage-inspired pieces are my particular forte."

*inspects it*

That looks pretty accurate to me, right?  "Vintage-inspired" is such a vague term that it does pretty easily net everything that's not covered by "steampunk assemblage," "organic freehand wirework" or "found objects," right?  Of course, I just wrote an article explaining why people shouldn't use blanket terms, but I was talking about individual descriptions.

Other style elements I contemplated noting but tossed out:

Medium-length earrings.  I don't make a lot of short ones but these are the longest I've ever made, bar the ones intended for belly dancers, like the tassels and those sweet shell and pewter leverbacks I made for M's tribal-gothic-fusion outfit for the Azkatraz ball last year, which were eight inches long and laid on her lovely collarbones.

Available here.

These are more standard for me, though still a little longer than average:


Available here.

My fondness for brass and copper.  It's still unfashionable to genuinely like these.  This is partly because everyone is now convinced that they are allergic to everything.  That's not actually the case.  Unfortunately, antique and gunmetal brass treatments do contain enough nickel to irritate some people -- but usually that's not the case in a necklace or bracelet.  I had to (stop reading if you are, M) have a crown replaced a couple of years ago and the dentist called in his entire staff to show them what a really severe nickel allergy inflammation in the mouth looks like.  I wear nickel-containing brass treatments all the time.  I just can't handle them as earwires for lengthy periods.

I'm not saying people aren't really allergic to jewelry metals.  It happens.  It's just that everyone thinks they are and it's really not the case for many of them. 

More to the point, I like brass and copper.  They weather beautifully.  All metals tarnish, people, with the sole exception of gold.  All of the metals.  All of them.  The copper-brass-gunmetal spectrum does so with a beautiful old-world grace that, in my opinion, is better than looking like it was just made forever.


I do, however, use a germanium sterling on my coral and such, because I don't want my white coral branches to stain.

Sparkle!  This is weird, because most of the other designers I really like oxidize the shit out of everything.

Really bizarre interpretations of other styles.  Even if I try to do Southwestern or Cutesy Chic or Meaningful Assemblage or something, it all comes out looking like me playing with elements of those styles.  And there's no way to put that in a description without sounding like a narcissist ("Tee hee, I'm SO unique!!!") but, on balance, I think that's something to be proud of.


And a final note.  I didn't set out to do any of this.  It just happened to be the way in which I do things.  Maybe that's my early materials influencing everything else I've ever done, maybe it's that the beads and components I pick contribute to it, maybe I'm influenced by my grandmother's crazy 60's jewelry she let me wear, but -- all those "develop your style" posts had nothing to do with this.  So anyone who's landed here by Googling "how to develop a personal jewelry style" or some such -- just do it.  It happens this way.

But if you're like me you'll have to make a blog post three years later before you get a firm idea of what your style is.

Good show, good show!

Had a show today! UCR's Market Day, to be exact. It's never been a hugely profitable venue but I maintained my hopes and ... er ... was rewarded. There's a lot of competition from the little let's-buy-lots-of-child-labor-plastic-crap-and-sell-it-for-a-dollar outfits, but I tend to do okay.

Last night was spent agonizing over packing my jewelry into its carrying drawers (WalMart clear plastic storage drawers with a liner of squishy eggcrate foam -- works like a dream) and trying to figure out how exactly I display some of the new products: the button bracelets have to be fastened around a bracelet roll in order to look right, and I have rings and pendants to deal with now ... bigger table, though, which helped.

Incidentally, the fastest way to make a bracelet roll for display? A paint-roller, some Elmer's spray adhesive and a little of your table-cover fabric.

But, point is, I made about my average ... and then someone came at the very end of the day and spent ninety dollars on me.

Squee.

Wire and Bat-Squid and Rings, oh my!

A busy weekend for us! M has no fewer than three squid commissions going (Ron Weasley, Batman and Harley Quinn) so she sewed all yesterday. Batman is adorable. He's made of black fleece and deep grey suedecloth, and has a dark grey mask behind his eyes and a yellow fleece toolbelt (pockets and all) around his head. His heart/mouth (she always puts a heart patch between the tentacles, so it's both mouth and heart at once) is the Bat-signal. Tonight we have to get a fabric marker, because I'm going to draw a chess knight on Ron's heart.

We also organized a lot of my beads, pendants and findings. Since M is obsessive-compulsive on a wonderful, wonderful level, she organized them all by color last Christmas when I was struck down with the demon mononucleosis -- and we hadn't done it in a while. God, the number of beads I have.

Finally, I photographed a whole lot of inventory, which means two things:

a.) New items are being posted at last, and
b.) I get to give a blog preview of the new wire-wrapped rings!

This one is in Christmas colors and distressed copper/black wire. It has a nice layered look.

Available here.

This is a pendant-ring set. Unfortunately, I think the bead arrangement on the ring is a little too broad for comfortable wear.

Available soon!

And this one uses a nugget of rich, chocolatey agate and some brass beads that match the ring base. I think this is where I best pulled off the balance of metal tones.

Available soon!

I'm still playing with the technique (combination of wire gauges=yes, nylon-jawed pliers to flatten the wire=no), but those are the three I like best.

Some thoughts for the ... morning? Noontide?

* I would really like to know what I'm doing right with Alchemy bids.

Seriously. I've had tons of interest and two commissions in the same number of weeks. What gives? What changed?

* Wire wrapping is AWESOME.

I've always loved heavily wire-wrapped pieces -- the ones that have that woodlandy, chaotic beauty with wire wrapping in on itself in layers and layers -- and yesterday, with some brass ring bases I got on clearance and leftover silver and brown copper wire, I think I got the hang of it. I'm wearing one of the rings right now (a piece of what I think is agate and fluted antique brass rounds, with a spiral of goldtone and wrapping in silvertone wire, on a wide antique brass ring base) and it gives me a little flutter of joy every time I look at my left hand. I also did a pendant with Czech pressed glass blossoms and leaves over a leftover square glass bead, and it has a WONDERFUL fairy-garden look. I feel like an artist.

* Condescending people suck.

I understand the need to distinguish between art and assembly, but this leads to a certain ... attitude in the Etsy forums. Technically under the Etsy rules putting a purchased pendant on a purchased chain qualifies the result to be sold as "handmade." And I understand that putting beads on a wire doesn't sound any more "handmade" to someone who hand-solders recycled metal, or some such. But statements like "Even the beader does SOME design work" make my hackles rise. Quilters select fabrics to go together in a pattern, I select beads and components to go together in a pattern, if you look at my pieces you can see I'm not just putting stuff together randomly or putting the same bead on the wire thirty times, don't dishonor my art form. *sigh*

* The average high school graduate has no understanding of tone.

I judge this by my own students. They're bright, bright kids, and they think they know it until I ask them to identify it, and then we both suddenly realize the kid has no clue what I'm trying to point out.

* I saw an EXcellent play last week.

"Doin' Time in the HomoNoMo Halfway House: How I Survived the Ex-Gay Movement," by Peterson Toscano, is a phenomenal show. I share an office at work with the performer, Vincent Cervantes, and he's as kind, funny and wise in person as onstage. Also, he's got enough acting talent to make you both laugh out loud and get a lump in the throat within the same three-minute section of the show. Anyone who has acted knows how hard it is to make a mood whiplash like that effective. If you have a chance to see this, run-don't-walk to get tickets. It's both roaringly funny and touchingly meaningful.

* I have GOT to be more careful about cutting chain.

I have a charm bracelet I may have to remake tonight because I misjudged and clipped it too short by one. Freaking. Link. It's a fun charm bracelet, though; 60's music flower-power themed with some I *heart* NY stuff. So not as bad as it could be.

Work happy!

I went to my second day of training for my new tutoring job today, and halfway through the instructor whose class I'm assigned to came in and handed me a note saying "Let's have coffee" with her phone number. We went after the training session to do so, and she asked me halfway to the car, "What books do you like for this course?" I told her I hadn't been terribly thrilled by the booklist, but ... "No booklist. I'm post-six," she told me (post-six lecturers have something one step below tenure; they are the Most Awesome). "What books do you want to do?"

We're still going over it, but we've agreed to do The Yellow Wallpaper, probably scenes from Hamlet and/or Othello (my favorite play), and maybe a little T.S. Eliot, with the possibility of showing "Another Brick in the Wall."

I am so, so thrilled to be doing this.

Tonight, I restring a paid commission and some things for M's grandmother's sister. Restringing is pretty good for the money, honestly, especially because people usually end up giving me spare vintage beads. I'm doing an anklet for an Etsy customer, previously on elastic, with gemstone teardrops hanging to swing freely from small hammered silver rings, which interrupt the bead strand. This takes a little (a lot) longer and rather more stringing medium than simply hanging the teardrops from the wire by either their drill holes or by jump rings, but it should look very lovely when done.

Fimo is our friend

M and I spent most of the day playing with fimo clays. M made a fairy door with yellow roses on the frame, a gorgeous thing. I made several pendants, some of which worked, some of which cracked through. Many of these will be showing up on Etsy in the next few weeks.

I quickly discovered that simple tools work very well for this task. A deck of playing cards and an old rolling pin work as a slab roller, and my jewelry-making charms work just as well as texture sheets to give the clay surface designs. Great fun, and after some finishing with acrylic paint, the resulting pendant are absolutely beautiful.

Very special new offer through Aug 18!

This week, you do me a favor and I'll do you one ...

I still have several shop images that are on a background I was using before I switched to the unfinished pottery background you'll see in my more recent photos. I'd rather not have to retake all those pictures, so I need some of that jewelry to sell.

So, until 11:59 PM PST on Tuesday, August 18:

* The first item which was photographed on an old background entitles you to a free pair of earrings in your color of choice.
* The second item on an old background gets you absolutely free shipping for that item.
* The third item, and any subsequent purchases, will be discounted by 10% off the item's price.

To claim these rewards, enter the code "snow white" in the Notes to Seller section, along with the color in which you'd like your earrings made.


Available here.

That's actually a pretty good photo, if I do say so myself, but on some of them ... well, you can see why the light-colored background works better. Since I took the first couple batches of a photos, I've learned that I need texture to contrast with the usually glossy jewelry; to use light-but-not-white colors so the contrast doesn't go all wonky; and to avoid direct sunlight like a vampire soaked in orange oil.

So there you go -- the jewelry is just as beautiful and high-quality, but the photos are slightly lacking, so you get great deals on every item from that section you purchase!

Button bracelets are go!

Finally found the camera! As such, the button bracelets are going live on Etsy. The promised photos:


Available here.


Available here.

Another advantage of this technique? It finally gives me an excuse to buy colored wire. I use nylon-coated stainless-steel wire in my jewelry and while I've previously stuck to silver, gold, bronze and black, it comes in many many colors - even non-specific craft stores generally carry red and blue wire, and more colors can be bought as well. The wire doesn't show in most of my designs, but it's gorgeous in the button-weave bracelets.