Working Tuesday: Bird's Nest Pendant

I've been playing around with this bird's nest pendant idea - changing the variables a bit. Some have blue pearls, some black, some white. Some are using smaller gauge wire, some silver plate wire. Some are messier than others, some more symmetrical. As I continue to play, I enjoy the thought that just like nature, no two of these nests will ever be alike no matter how hard I try!

Working Tuesday: Nature's Call

You might have noticed I take a lot of photos that don't include people. Someone pointed this out when looking at a scrapbook of one of my vacations. I took over 1,000 photos on that vacation and had only 3 photos of people traveling with me - including pictures of me!

I think the answer to why this occurs is that nature and architecture inspire me. The order of architecture, the balance is calming to me. I love to see how curves are integrated into squares and vice versa. And the colors of nature teach me how color can come together in unusual ways. Look at the spectrum of green in one tree - from yellow to bluer greens.

I think, though, my greatest inspiration is the ocean. I certainly go back to those colors and textures. I love to use pearls and shells and my fingers itch to start sculpting sea creatures. The ocean too has variations in color. From far away it can look deep blue, but up close you see how light refracts to create greens and whites and blues. And sometimes, if you're in the right water, you can see the bottom of the ocean: sand, shells, sea creatures. Delightful!
This weeks projects reflect nature and the sea. One piece is the finished flower pendant I was working on last week. The other is a new piece using shell and diamond shaped pearls. I love how colors appear as the light hits that shell and those pearls. Pinks and blues shine through that creamy white color. Beautiful.

Working Tuesday: April showers bring May flowers...

Ok. I admit it. I know. I've been obsessed with flowers lately. Alright, so it's not a recent obsession, but the difference is now I'm posting them all over my blog, my website... you get the idea. And I think it's been leaking into my work. Ok, it IS leaking into my work.

A couple weeks ago I got some Swarovski petal pearls in an order from Fire Mountain gems thinking I would use them in some wedding accessories and I think the results were wonderful! I think I'm either going to use them in a comb or in individual hair pins. Either would be lovely!

I'd like to do the same thing with petal-like Keshi pearls, but have wondered if I can actually make a profit on something like that considering the Keshi pearls I liked were somewhere around $250 a strand!

Those flowers went so well for me, I picked up some petal shaped dichroic glass beads in pink. I added some pink buttons for the center and started playing around with those as pendants. The latest I've paired with rose quartz and some golden spacer beads. I'm still playing around with laying out the design, but I'm having fun with that result too.

Last weekend, after spending a day photographing Mama E's garden, I decided to pull together some bluebell earrings from some Czech flower beads that have been hanging around. I've been collecting flower beads for a couple years now and I'm just getting around to pulling together some designs with them - and I'm just getting started with what I've got!

So you'll probably be seeing more flowers. But it's spring, so that's probably not such a bad thing!

Shiny...Pretty... or what I did at the Gem and Jewelry Show

If you couldn't tell from my prior post, the G&J show is one of the highlights of my season. I love to see the trends - what stones, what colors, what styles - that, in my experience, often show up in stores soon thereafter.

This trip, I heard "the onion briolette" was an upcoming trend. I'm increasingly seeing this cut, but it was interesting to hear from the point of view of the sellers that they saw this as a trend.

Generally, I pick up colors and styles that appeal to me - not necessarily because I have a piece in mind or that it's trending, but just because I like it and think it interesting. As a result, I've amassed quite a palette of colors, textures and cuts to work with once I sit down to create. Setting a budget is essential (unless you're independently wealthy) because it's very easy to get carried away. I usually go over my budget, but I know when I hit that threshold it really has to be fantastic to get me to go beyond!

This trip I did pretty well. I stayed within $20 of the budget I set. I was pleased with the treasures I found. I was mainly looking for 4mm and 6mm beads to integrate into my button pendant necklaces. I want to make those more interesting. I was also looking for briolettes in pinks, purples and greens, but didn't find anything as large as I would like. (Thus, my onion briolette conversation!) And I'm always on the lookout for pearls for wedding jewelry.

I found a pretty little acorn cast in silver that I'm still creating around in my head. There were some lovely coral colored cloisonne flowers and some Tibetan looking beads with red glass cabochons. I also found some beautiful carved coral flowers that offer many possibilities.

My FAVORITE find, however, was a strand of pink amethyst onion briolettes. The fact that they were pink amethyst was fun enough, but what made them extraordinary was the aurora borealis coating (AB) that's been fired onto them. It really gives them interesting texture and I'm thinking of combining them with keshi pearls to bring out that lovely array of color. That's assuming I can ever bring myself to pay for the quality of pearls they deserve!

So anyway, more fun options and a wonderful time with a new friend. You can't beat that!