Friday, January 13th
13 JanThis necklace features a pendant by Olivia Dowdy. The raku-fired ceramic is lightweight and shimmery. I really love the glow of that poppy red. I’ve hung it from a naked brass chain that will age naturally, and added a Swarovski crystal coral branch.
A side note: my camera lens was broken and posting was difficult for a while. I fixed that in December but still hadn’t resumed posting. Today, after a few words of encouragement, I realized I just needed to get back to the routine.
Thanks, Ellie.
Thursday, July 20th
21 JulIt is hot here this week and I feel like I can barely be bothered to dress at all. I want to wear a single layer of linen from head-to-toe and haunt shady places all day.
Duty calls, though. There are meetings, library books to return, that darn google+ to figure out. I had to dress.
This necklace used to have a too-large, too-busy pendant that I cut up years ago. It does feature some Japanese wound-glass beads in red and white, plus vintage coral and crystals. The strand itself isn’t busy-just cheery.
Perfect for a day like today.
Tuesday, July 18th
19 JulThis necklace was one of the ones I made on my vacation. It’s made of knotted orange leather with wood and resin beads. The leather has a tricky slide clasp made of leather, too. I can wear the necklace at about 18″ or at 24″.
If I wasn’t trying to wear a different necklace every day for a year I’d want to wear this for days on end. It’s dramatic but unfussy.
Next year!
Tuesday, July 5th
6 JulThis necklace is one I sold quite a lot back in the dawn of pre-history.
Okay, maybe in 1998.
I was making and selling jewelry to various boutiques around the country and since the internet hadn’t yet been invented and the whole idea of costume jewelry that was NOT bright gold with giant fake stones was a novelty this was a popular little fetish necklace. That’s what I called these; Fetish Necklaces. There were other animals, all were constructed in a similar manner. The intention was that you’d layer this up with several other fetishes.
Because way back when, neo-Victoria, steampunky, romantic tribalism was totally new. Okay, maybe what I mean is that it was uncommon. There were a few of us out there; Kaari Meng, Arlon, Jill Schwartz and others. We made fancy romantic jewelry you could wear with a pair of silk-velvet overalls, a striped long-sleeve tee shirt and laced-up Gibson-girl boots. I had lots of black eyeliner, an armful of sparkly bracelets and crazy big fuzzy hair.
Okay, so nothing much has changed there except for the eyeliner.
This necklace is made from two stamped brass fish, back-to-back, with silk organza ribbon and a wrap of seed beads and wire. I am almost embarrassed to say that this little beauty sold for the wholesale price of $21. Now, the ribbon IS 32″ long, so you can wear this long OR short. There is a small amount of glue there holding the fish together should the wire-wrap ever fail. And did I mention that it was SILK organza?
But still, $21? That makes retail price somewhere around $42.
Wow.