Schachlo

I've been watching some traditional folk dances on Youtube.  It's quite inspiring.  There's always a sense of grandeur associated with folk dance and costumes, no matter how simple or sedate the actual steps are.  Well, I discovered a Russian Gypsy dance performed by Schachlo.  It's really quite beautiful.  Her costume and her jewelry features simple, repeating patterns and soft flowing feminine drapes and contours.  I just fell in love with the necklace.

Of course, I don't have a ton of gold coins and chains laying around.  Surprising, right?  Well, I can't recreate her necklace exactly, but I can make something similar, you know what I mean?  I set out to make this necklace some time ago and I've only recently gotten decent photos of it.

Bronze colors bring out the brilliance of the opalescent glass.

An iridescent crystal gives the whole thing more weight and charm.

The actual necklace rests just below the collarbones.

I like how it turned out.  I used some more beads and findings that I found in my stash to finally pull it together.  It's a bib-style necklace with dusky desert tones.  I love its sort of wild, tribal feel.  It's also very jingly.    My mother over at the Mahogany Stylist Blog loves it. 

Things That Look Like Other Things

You all know that I like things that look like other things.  If you don't know what I mean, here's some examples:  I used to have a flash drive that looked like a purple monkey.  I have a ton of erasers that look like realistic food.  I have a pin cushion that looks like a hat when you look at it from one angle and like sushi rolls from another.  I have a candle that looks like a spool of thread... And I like visually ambiguous patterns.

You can see where this is going.  Yup.  Jewelry making.  Did you know, that they have all kinds of dolamite and other stones that are artificially enhanced to look brighter and richer?  Did you KNOW that they have a whole host of beads and charms that look like cakes, fruit, and other things?  No?  You'd better hit up eBay and Etsy, then.  Just type in something ridiculous and attach 'beads' as a suffix.  You'll see some things. 

About a year ago, I started searching for and acquiring all sorts of these 'strange' beads.  The results were bright, flashy and candy inspired jewelry pieces that are positively adorable... and ridiculously HARD TO SELL!  It seems like I'm the only adult who likes this sort of stuff.  Ah well.  I did get some good photos of these things before I got rid of them or packed them away.

Let There Be CAKE! 

Just a Cherry Key Fob.

I love these things.  I ended up keeping them for selfish reasons.

These used to be shank buttons.

Such Sparkle.

Each strawberry is a locket.  I wish I still had this one.

I love how you can get polyclay slices of fruit these days.  Super easy to use!

This one reminds me of Tang. 

It's Valentine's Day?

So, it's Valentine's Day, better known as 'Single's Awareness Day'.  It's a commercial holiday designed to stimulate a frenzy of purchasing after the consumer's long January hibernation.  For many, it's a day to be spent with a significant other, doing 'romantic' things with flutes of champaigne.  For others, it's a time to lament spending yet another 'couple's holiday' sitting at home watching rom-coms and doubting themselves. 
Strangely enough, Valentine's day's tradition had nothing to do with couples.  It was supposed to be a feast day for Saint Valentinus, who performed marriages for soldiers, ministered to people under Roman rule, and healed sick children.  The tradition of the 'Valentine' comes from the way he used to sign his letters.   Somehow the modern era equates selfless acts with sexy gifts and boot-knockin'. 

WELL.  I'm not on board with any of that creepy stuff.  I don't think it's a day to aggressively assert the value of romance.  I'm actually a bit more fond of its original intended purpose: sharing your true feelings with ALL the people you care about with warm letter or- because we're so modern now- a phone call. 

In the meantime, want to look pretty, red, shiny things?

These key fobs are super cute.  I made a few, but I've only got one left.

This one's got a strong Victorian flavor.  Look up the language of fruit and flowers.

Just something cute and cliche.

An industrial styled wire wrapped pendant on leather cord...

Most of these are necro-posts of things I did before I had a blog, or things that I didn't feel like posting earlier.  Sorry about that. 

This one's got more of a masculine flavor...

A brooch!

Sexy Earrings with a little Chachacha.

I will probably spend the rest of today working on projects or, maybe hanging out with friends and family that I don't get to see that often.  The rest of you, stay away from that crotch floss they're marketing as Valentine's Day lingerie! Do something constructive! 

Google deleted my blog favorites.

because this is how women dress when no one's looking

I am ticked.  I got up with the intention of checking my blog favorites for new posts before updating my own blog and what do I find?  A big fat NOTHING!  ZIP.  ZILCH.  NADA!  NOTHING.  Except, this annoyingly chipper message, "You don't have any favorites added yet. Copy and paste the blog URLs to add them to your favorites list!"  I swear!  If computers weren't so flipping expensive, I'd have hucked mine out of the window.

What's worse is this GLITCHY little update made me feel stupid!  You know, computer and application makers LOVE to make updates that change around how things are organized and where they appear on the page for NO BLASTED REASON: So, I kept thinking, "Maybe I'm going to the wrong part of blogger dashboard.  I'll keep looking!"  NO!  I wasn't.  I was going to the absolute correct place, but that didn't matter.

SOMEHOW this 'New Blogger' update seems to think that my favorite blogs list is for the trash!  So if I somehow UNFOLLOWED you, it's not because I hate you or don't like your blog, it's because this wretched program decided to say, "You don't need to look at these, LULZ!"  and totally troll-faced me!



EDIT: And then when I post a rant on it, my blog favorites magically reappear.  That's it Google.  I AM WATCHING YOU.

Oakenshield

As you guys may have guessed already, I love high fantasy, science-fiction, and other such whimsical nonsense.  First of all, it is NOT nonsense.  It's...

That aside, I love Lord of the Rings.  Do not start with Elven language and the Silmarillion.  I'm not that heavily invested in Tolkien's works.  I just like mythology and fantasy stories.

Recently, I've been inspired by the Hobbit Franchise that has been buzzing around the theaters.  The costumes for the Rings Trilogy were fabulous, the story was great (read the books first kids), and I enjoyed the characters.  Naturally, I was looking forward to this new franchise for the same reasons.   However, it wasn't until I saw THIS that I recognized that it can be an excuse to make pretty jewelry.

FEMALE OAKENSHIELD!  This picture is by Alexander Turchanin.  Look him up.

I started work on my own 'Oakenshield' inspired artpiece- though, it's decidedly not as mind-bending as this one.  I tried to make use of the rich blues that you see in his costume as well as pick elements that hint at the intricacies of his armor.

Simple, yet forceful.

 The depth and starkness of the crystal in the pendant reminded me both of the planes of his face (specifically his brow and nose) as well as his eyes.  Steely gray against deep blue is a great combination.

 In the various incarnations of the Lord of the Rings franchise, the devil is always in the details.  I picked a pendant that combined simple, unfrilly shapes with some intricacies to make it a bit more special.  You can't have a big, round, shimmering pendant be your artistic representation of Oakenshield.  That's just wrong.

This was fun and easy to make.  Just simple wire wrapping and careful balancing of the elements.  In hindsight, Oakenshield would probably have gone for less crystal in favor of more of that dusky steel, but he's not in charge here.  I am.  HA!  Well.  Happy crafting.

Industrial Strength Necklace

It's been a struggle keeping up my momentum recently, but I'm doing my best to put the Crafting Supplies of Years Passed to good use.  I have some truly bizarre things in my stash...  Sometimes, it's  much more difficult than I'd like to admit to pull together a good design that sticks with the trends and my aesthetic.  Here is another bauble that I made out of the treasure trove of findings I uncovered not too long ago.

First, is a stodgy and imposing sort of pendant.  It's composed of a large, heavy, dull gray steel ...wheel?  I don't know what the heck it is.  It was interesting and unusual and I could see possibilities.

It's a necklace and a bludgeoning implement.

The 'wheel' acts as the focal, drawing attention towards itself with its heavy shape and sparkling rhinestones.  I didn't want the necklace to look like a grungy chain with a rock on it, so I added some swarovskis and a tassel at the end of the focal to feminize it a bit.

Still, the industrial look of this particular opera length necklace isn't for everyone.  Thanks to the copious sparkle, it CAN be worn as an edgy accessory to a more formal outfit or to dress up a very casual ensemble. 

As I was struggling to get good pictures of this design, I kept thinking that I needed a model to help me truly showcase it.  Sorry to bother a cliche, but the photos do it no justice.  Anyone know anybody who'd pose for pictures in sparkly stuff in exchange for small gifts?

Craft Supplies: The Gift That Keeps Giving Part Two

In my last post, you read about my process in creating modestly vamped up headphones.  Before I show you the final design, I'll show you some of my crappy sketches of my earlier ideas for them.   The process was kind of long and drawn out- more than it needed to be, since a lot of the earlier designs were impossible with the headphone's ..rather mobile design.

The ribbon I wanted to use was the wrong shade.  Uck.

I abandoned this design because it reminded me of Katy Perry's Cupcake bustier.

The idea behind this one was to make it exotic and wild.

With that out of the way, I'll give you the thing you've been waiting for.  The final project.  Keep in mind that even with this design there were flaws.  My shaky hands sometimes make it hard to get things PERFECT and even on the things I did well on, the design suffered because they don't make rhinestones the same way they used to.  The foils have a tendency to warp. 

I didn't realize it at the time, but the headphones were attracting lint.

 Here's the final design for the ear piece.  You can see how I tried to work the logo in with my design to give it a ghoulish quality and a little sparkle without it being over-powering.

Sparkles and roses.

 I added sparkling ribbon to the upper headpiece to help break up all the bright acid purple.  The velvet also takes care of a design flaw in the headphones themselves.  They don't slip off my head if I loosen them up around my ears.  I added a rose to one of the bands as well because I sort of messed up on the application of the ribbon.  Learned that trick from the food network.  Cover your mistakes with pretty flowers (Although, they were talking about cake.).

I'll give them another brush off before I wear them, to make sure I didn't miss any stray lint.

Overall, I'm glad with the way they turned out, even if it's not ABSOLUTELY PERFECT.  I can live with it.