Hello readers, and lovers of unusual handmade statement jewellery, it is nice of you to drop by the Caprilicious blog this week. It will be three years this week since I started Caprilicious Jewellery as an entity, although I had been dabbling in jewellery making before, gifting away all the pieces I made to my friends (most of whom have remained friends in spite of this). These are the first pieces I made for the website - I hope the ladies who bought them are still enjoying them. It is because of your support, readers, that Caprilicious exists, and I thank you sincerely from the bottom of my heart. My photography skills have certainly improved since then, and my wire work has got more and more complex. I have worked tirelessly in every direction, be it making the piece, blogging, making components, improving my wire work, varying designs, and improving and promoting my website - as well as doing my day job. People ask where I find the time - I cannot answer that question - I think if you love to do something, time magically makes itself available. Of course it helps that Mike and I live a fairly quiet life, I couldn't have dealt with the rigours of a massive social whirl as well as all that I already do. PavoI've always loved the peacock and usually have one or two on my books. The last one was called Scherezade and now, I present Pavo - Pavo is the Latin name for Pavo cristatus or the crested peacock. I spent a couple of evenings weaving the torque without knowing how it would end and what it would become - but as time passed, it became clear that the piece would be my next peacock feather. I had just finished it and put it away when I saw a picture posted on Facebook on one of the jewellery groups I belong to - I almost fell off my chair! This one is a diamond, opal and pearl necklace set in platinum, from Boodles - Oh well! The one above is mine, and I'm just as proud of it as if it were made of diamonds and platinum! The Face that Launched a Thousand Ships (Not)Helen of Troy was the original face that launched a thousand ships - they were launched into a bloody battle, and all because she left her husband and ran off with Paris, her handsome young boyfriend. If I were her hubby Agamemnon, I'd have let her go and found myself another woman - Helen was obviously a mental lightweight who went for a pretty face. Instead, a thousand ships and men were launched into an all out battle where everyone was the loser. My face cane was made under instruction from Layle McDill - when I bought the tutorial I didn't realise that quite so much clay would be involved - by the time I finished the cane weighed a couple of pounds. I now have a cane that is going to last me ages and ages, unless I can find things to do with it. Here's a little peek into the making of my face cane. First, I made the lips and eyes - a bit scary, cos it looked like a duck face when I put them together. I had to speak sternly to myself, just to soothe the anxiety away - sometimes I have to give myself a pep talk, or I wouldn't get anywhere. I added a nose and cheeks and a sheet of clay to outline the lot, et voila! a face - but this one was scary enough to frighten little children - it certainly wouldn't have attracted Paris, or even launched one single, teeny weeny boat! 'What's done is done', I said to myself, eerily echoing Helen of Troy, so I started to reduce the cane between my work tile and a sheet of perspex - and Hey! the face that emerged in the centre of the cane ain't half bad - not a ship launcher, I'll grant you that, but good enough for the purpose I have planned for it. The other ends of the cane look like the saying - she has a 'face like a slapped a%@e', but the bit in the middle that I am concerned with, looks just like Layle intended when she wrote the tutorial, so well done me! At least it doesn't look like the mask out of Scream - although it might have been fitting as it is Halloween week. So now I have to go away and think of a million different things to do with the cane. You'll find it cropping up all over the place, I suspect - I am quite proud of it. I made the cane in order to use my latest toy - a cane slicer, which I think is a fabulous tool - if I can manage not to cut off my fingertips! It works like a guillotine - I shall refrain from making the 'let them eat cake' jokes that spring so readily to mind! Penny Vingoe who sold it to me talked a good talk when she demo'ed it, so that by the second day of a two day meeting, I was convinced that I wanted it - no, make that needed it. There was even a choice of a pink or blue one, and 'if you're feeling rich', an all chrome one, for 'just a few quid more' (no, I wasn't feeling rich, thank you very much, guilty was what I was feeling). I brought it home in my hot little hands, but unfortunately it took a while to assemble, with a few bits missing from the box that needed to be sent on, and a few mystery bits in the kit that weren't required - it is now fully operational and ready for action on my new face cane! Of course, I haven't told hubby how much I spent on it - I wouldn't be able to give out to him self righteously when he wastes money on unnecessary purchases then, would I?? AmbrosiaAs it is party time, I thought I'd refill my Bling album. These trapezoid shaped crystals had been sitting in my cupboard, waiting for just such a moment and were quite pleased to be let out of confinement. The golden yellow crystals were teamed with other gemstone beads in the same colour spectrum -and the resulting necklace is called Ambrosia - Food of the Gods - there is a lot of debate whether ambrosia and nectar are one and the same - some say nectar is the liquid, while others seem to think that ambrosia is liquid food, like soup - I have no idea what the gods eat or drink - or whether they should be doing such mundane things in the first place ( In Hindu temples, they have ceremonies where the Gods are woken up, dressed, breakfasted - conveniently leaving out inconvenient bodily functions that us mere mortals have to put up with to survive). Another Peacock - MayuriPavo flew away to a new home, so it was imperative that another peacock had to be made - this one has a peacock feather on a faceted shell pearl necklace - simple, but effective. Blue dyed jade beads and green enamelled beads give the piece added interest. I made a couple of these with a peacock feather pendant earlier, using freshwater pearls and quartz crystals - you can decide which one you like best. And finally..drumroll........ the last piece I made - a bit at a time, over the entire week until it was finished just as I finished writing the blog............ NirvanaA serene handcarved bone face was teamed with a slice of shell - it looked like a picture of someone meditating. I knew what I wanted to make and had the elements picked out - but I had no idea how I would put them together. The face was from Indonesia and probably a Buddha - it wasn't difficult to imagine that the piece of shell was a sun/ chakra. Making this piece was almost a form of meditation - I let the wire take me where it would and this is what emerged. I was really pleased because it was picked up off G+ even before I posted it on the website - I do love it so when someone displays enthusiasm for my efforts.
That's it for this week folks. Do come back next week - it is Caprilicious' birthday week and I will be posting a giveaway on my Facebook Page. Catch you next week, same time, same place xx
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Hello readers, and lovers of unusual handmade statement jewellery, it is nice of you to drop by the Caprilicious blog this week. It is party time again - and of course as the days draw shorter and the weather gets colder, what we all want to do is cheer ourselves up, enough to be able to wait out the winter months until everything comes full circle and we can go out into the garden again. I've been making evening wear most of last week - I had almost forgotten what fun it was to throw lashings of crystals and other shiny stuff together and see what occurs. AngeliqueShe was made with clear crystal teardrop beads, coated with an AB sheen - I thought I'd add a favourite colour - turquoise - to act as an accent, and I think any of you angels would look fabulous with it decorating your decolletage, the teardrops dripping into the neckline.
BewitchedMalaikaMalaika is one of the best known Swahili songs originating from Tanzania, sung here by 'Mama Africa' herself, Miriam Makeba. I bought six strands of orange crystals last year, but when I got them out this week, I felt that perhaps the colour was too flashy. In an attempt to mitigate the psychedelic, sun-glasses requiring effect of the orange, I teamed them with a piece of labradorite. The labradorite was wrapped in wire to form a connector, and I made all the other bead caps and connectors myself - all except the toggle clasp - the necklace is long enough to slip over the head, but I added the clasp only to indicate how the necklace should be worn, for someone who isn't used to the asymmetry that has become the norm in pieces from Caprilicious. This particular piece of labradorite is very flashy - if I aimed to dull the orange with it, perhaps it wasn't the best choice of stone - but I do think they go well together. Nicole Hanna set us a challenge - she published a small part of one of her designs and asked us to take it as far as we could - we weren't allowed to change the 'ingredients'. Here is a Pinterest album of the 50 pieces that went in, including mine. The one on the left is her piece, as she designed it, and the one on the right, Unfinished Symphony, is mine. Nicole's pieces are all neat and tidy - I obviously like a few more curlicues and embellishments- they happened quite unconsciously as I allowed the wire to take shape and flow where it would. Her piece is called 'The Evil Eye' and I suppose it does look rather wicked, mainly because of the 'eyebrow' which seems to be set in a scowly frown - mine is also an eye, but it is a benign eye, probably from a dancer at the Moulin Rouge, all wide eyed and high kicking, with false eyelashes and sequins - apologies if that sounds too fanciful to you. I belong to a wire wrappers group on Facebook and they set a challenge to make a piece of jewellery using 12" of fairly thick wire, which can be difficult to manipulate, being quite stiff. I like to take part in these challenges - it shakes those grey cells out of their torpor - and this pendant is what I made............... I tried to write 'Caprilicious' - but I'm not sure what to do about the pesky 'I' - but I will work it out one of the days. See what I mean?? Autumn ConcertoI went to 'Polydays', a polymer clay weekend a short while ago and learned a fabulous technique from Loretta Lam who makes the most interesting, one of a kind beads. The beads are reversible and having made one necklace for myself, I made a second one using the same technique. People love these beads - they've been telling me so all week - I wear my necklace all the time and love it. Here's the second Autumn Concerto. The beads are light, being made with an ultralight clay, and the two round beads on the end are actually hollow. That's another week accounted for folks - thanks for stopping by - I see some new blog followers in the last few weeks - welcome to my new readers, it always gladdens my heart to see a new reader notification, otherwise I feel as if I'm burbling on to myself. I know more people read the blog than are subscribed - I'm not sure why this is - perhaps you are anxious about spam? It is easy enough to subscribe, all you have to do is click on the Bloglovin or Networked Blogs link on the sidebar and follow the instructions. I promise not to hand your email id out to scammers and spammers, honest, cross my heart and hope to die!
I am working at the day job this weekend, but if it isn't too busy, I shall put a few things in my kiln, unless Mike has other plans. Have a fantastic week, and I'll catch you next Friday, same time, same place xx Hello readers and lovers of statement jewellery everywhere, it is nice of you to drop by the Caprilicious blog. This week I've had time to put together a few multistrand necklaces - getting ready for Bling season in the main - there are only 89 days to Christmas and it will soon be the time of year for pretty things and gifts. I hope that some of you will be sufficiently enthused by what you are looking at to pick up your gifts from Caprilicious. I am happy to gift wrap and send the parcel to an address of your choice with a little card from you, all you have to do is ask. The Shaman's Necklace'Shaman are spiritual guides and practitioners, not of the divine, but of the very elements. Unlike some other mystics, shaman commune with forces that are not strictly benevolent. The elements are chaotic, and left to their own devices, they rage against one another in unending primal fury. It is the call of the shaman to bring balance to this chaos.' Labradorite is a Feldspar with a rich play of colours called Labradorescence, first discovered in Labrador, Canada. The North American Indians call it the Stone of Shamans - it is meant to aid clarity of thought, protect against negativity and from misfortune, thus bringing balance to chaos. I love it because it shines so beautifully when moved in the light -at one angle it is a boring grey stone, but move it a bit and Wow! it flashes with such brilliant colour one is simply carried away by its beauty. Combined with rare and beautiful grossular green garnets and a copper wire surround, the labradorite is superb. IsabellaInspired by Isabella Rossellini's shirt necklace in Death Becomes Her, this is my first 'Bling' necklace of the year. Ms Rossellini would look beautiful in a sack, but when she rose out of the water and glided over to her robe purring like a little panther, I just knew that one day I would make a necklace like hers. With plenty of crystals and hammered gold tone links, it shines beautifully, and although I haven't gone overboard, it is still pretty opulent. RougeCoral, freshwater pearls and an ornate clasp - my muse was in seventh heaven. A pair of earrings complete the parure which is going to be worn with a black and cream lace dress and a little black net fascinator at a wedding. Daytime Bling - MonetThis painting of water lilies by Monet has so many beautiful colours, and I have been collecting pictures of them to use as inspiration for a piece of jewellery for the longest time - here is the picture, and the necklace - You like?? I love... MoonlightThis necklace was made for a moonlit walk along the edge of the sea, the breeze blowing in your hair, scarf and skirt billowing - dancing in the moonlight. The pearls and blue jade are ethereal, lending themselves to romance on a moonlit night. If I knew the lady in the picture, I would offer her this necklace. La PrincipessaStarThese two pairs of earrings are so organic, they almost made themselves - I just took the wire where it seemed to want to go and after a while, the earrings appeared as if by magic - they both started with the same material in the same quantities, but ended up being so different. The difficulty with organic designs is to know when to stop with the curls and squiggles and say "The End" ! That's it for this week folks. I have to report that my kittens are pretty useless at being helpers - they sleep most of the day and when awake fight with one another or eat me out of home and hearth - I sound like my mother complaining about her 'helpers' !! I go to my third Polydays in the Cotswolds this week and am sure to bring back some fabulous ideas to Caprilicious. See you next week, same time, same place xx Hello readers, thanks for stopping by to read about the statement jewellery made at Caprilicious this week. It was my privilege to provide a piece of jewellery to the Children's Unit at the hospital as a raffle prize - the manager who requested it of me was very complimentary about the piece I handed in - I was quietly pleased with it myself, and the reaction on the Facebook page was heartening when I posted some pictures there. The carved jade flower had been lying around in my stash, just waiting to be used and this is a very worthy cause, very close to my heart. If you're wondering what the mention of statement jewellery in the opening line was all about - I've been reading blogging guides - and the theory is that a googlebot, which in my imagination looks like the picture above, worms it's way into a website and if the raison d'être of the blog is mentioned in the first few sentences, the botworm gets the message - and when people look for 'Handmade Statement Jewellery', the Caprilicious Jewellery website comes up in a Google search - having done this for a few weeks, I was quite gratified to find that I haven't been misguided by the bloggers guide. However, I don't know any woman who goes to Google when she wants to look for handmade statement jewellery! I certainly wouldn't do a Google search to look for jewellery, would you?? What beats me is that knowing this fact doesn't make me chase the botworm any less frantically - just shows how competitive I really am, I suppose, and also that I like to test a theory before I accept it as common wisdom. AnatevkaAnatevka was a fictional shtetl in Imperial Russia where the musical Fiddler on the Roof was set. We went to the Eutin Festival in Germany, where they had this musical on, inspiring me to create this necklace. I acquired a necklace of hand knotted shell pearls in beautiful colours of bronze/ cream, peach and shades of grey - the pearls are large and very beautiful, and though I normally would have cut up the necklace to restring the pearls, this one was so well made, I couldn't bring myself to wantonly destroy someones painstaking work - in fact, I had to agree that I couldn't have done it better ( a rare admission for me ). I decided to make a pendant for it, and string it onto the necklace directly. An agate druzy cabochon, surrounded by wire lace, with pearls and crystals thrown in just grew and grew until two days later, my muse declared it finished. Although wire lace looks pretty, it is hard work on the finger tips which resembled Shreddies by the time I was done - but hey! I love the way it looks, so won't complain. The pendant is very baroque in appearance, and suits the necklace - and the name! If you want to know what shell pearls are, here's a link to a very well written article I found during my research - I couldn't have put it better myself. And with this, I decided to put my Lacemania aside for a while - and my fingertips heaved a huge sigh of relief!! I've had two new helpers this week - Charlie and Wilfred have moved in with us - they must have been techies in a previous life, they are fascinated by the moving cursor on my laptop screen, and keep trying to help me type this blog and won't take no for an answer. They are also interior decorators of sorts, and are helping me to remodel my house and change the decor, by systematically destroying anything they dislike - Mike's 40 year old German oil lamp (he's had it 40 years, but it was an antique when he first bought it) is something they have taken a dislike to - only he refuses to part with it - the boys are most annoyed that it is now out of reach! Silver MonsoonWith my fingertips sore and out of commission, I decided to give them a rest. I have these peacock feather pendants in from Indonesia - the ends have been fringed, much like a Rastafarians dreadlocks, with beads, and I love the effect. I used shards of electroplated quartz needles in the necklace, strung with spacers of crackle quartz in a deep peacock blue and a couple of enamelled beads from India. The quartz needles remind me of the silver rain that sheets down during a monsoon - the rain in the UK though persistent, is usually gentler. DurgaDurga is a wrathful form of Parvati, otherwise known as Mrs Shiva, and the mother of Ganesh the elephant God. Kali is an even more angry form - women of all ages, at different times of their cycles have fleeting resemblances to one or another avatar of this multipurpose Goddess. According to legend, Parvathi was peed off at something- or someone (possibly, but not necessarily hubby), and she knitted her brows together in a frown - a third eye originated there ( watch out - the gaze from that third eye when provoked into opening can burn you into a frazzle). When someone else peed the already irritated Durga off, she went wild, hair unbound, arms akimbo - and she didn't stop until she killed the annoyance, hung his head around her neck and drank his blood. She laughed and laughed, and did a dance that a whirling dervish would have envied, until suddenly to her horror, she found that she was trampling on her poor husband Shiva - Oops! she said and stuck her tongue out - and an ancient photographer took her picture (or maybe the wind changed and her facial expression stuck), so she is doomed to being immortalised as the crazy one with her tongue stuck out, hair wild, with strings of demon's heads hung about her person. This story, I am sure will resonate with my female readers - we've all been there, pootling along, minding our own, when along comes this nuisance - whether we turn into Durga or Kali depends on the irritant! Anyway, I digress - this necklace is made of a pendant from the Banjara tribe in India, with two paisa coins from 1962. I put them on a rope, which can be tied so that the pendant sits where you would like it to and can be worn with all sorts of necklines. It looks like something Durga might like to wear - well, she's most definitely a Caprilicious woman.................... That's it for this week folks. Charlie has destroyed a bunch of silk flowers I had prettifying a dull corner of the house, and the two brothers are now flicking the flowers around the house like crazed confetti - I'd better go and rescue what's left of those poor flowers. Have a fab weekend, and I'll catch you next week, same time, same place
xx When I first started to make jewellery, I was given a piece of advice which has stayed with me - a pretty clasp lifts a simple necklace to greater heights, like nothing else can. Since then, I have been a clasp junkie, spending prodigious amounts of money on store bought clasps. When I had the exhibition over in India, I watched ladies walking around the room, and to a (wo) man they all noticed the clasps. In fact, one woman chased me around the room asking me where I had got them from, and would I please sell her some, forgetting that this was an exhibition of jewellery, not jewellery findings, and that I was highly unlikely to be carrying extra clasps in my suitcases! My love affair with the clasp has continued to the extent that I am now making clasps for myself, in an effort to make them one of a kind and different from the ones that other jewellery makers use. Tutorials from the likes of Nicole Hanna and inspiration from Sharon Solly have helped, as well as a book by Denise Peck in my latest endeavour. I sent a sample to my friend BN, and she used the clasp in ten different ways and sent me photographs to show me what she had done with it - she still hasn't told me which one of the ways was her final choice for the necklace she made! Ten Ways to Use a Clasp, by BN I also made some faux lamp work glass toggle clasps out of polymer clay and wire using a tutorial written by Amber of Caterpillar Arts and inspiration from work by Sharon Solly - these are colourful and playful and I will need to find the right beads for them. The Dryad Another toggle clasp inspired by Nicole Hanna was used in a necklace made of wood grain jasper and gold coloured crystals - I tried to break up the browny - golds of the necklace with blue crystal beads and dichroic glass. Dryads are tree nymphs in Greek mythology, each one looking after a particular tree in the woods, punishing thoughtless mortals who injure their trees. Ariel This necklace was named after the beautiful mystical, serene, angelic face in this pendant. The Archangel Ariel, predominantly in Hebrew writings, is thought to be the angel of nature - had she been Greek, she would probably have been closely related to a Dryad, as she too guards nature and trees and punishes humans who harm them. The quartz needle points in the necklace have been heat treated and coated with titanium and gold vapour, and teamed with green crackle quartz. I made the wire accent beads myself out of yards and yards of fine wire wrapped over a frame. African Queen It was a beautiful weekend, the sun was shining, the peonies were out and we went to the pub for Sunday lunch. These hollow faux ebony and ivory focal beads in my hoard were just right to wear with white linen summer clothes - I strung them on waxed linen cord, with bone beads and cowrie shells - summer necklaces for the boho chick! Cosmic Spirals Spirals are a compelling shape and have universal appeal - I'm not sure why this is, perhaps because they are the most natural shape seen by our eyes and enter the subconscious right from the very beginning. The spiral shows up often in nature - in the pattern of seeds in a seedhead, in the growing tips of ferns, in the pattern that leaves grow on a stem, in the shape of a nautilus shell, and imprints itself deep into the subconscious mind, so that when seen again the shape is familiar and pleasing to the eye. I too love spiral patterns, and made these faux bone hollow beads with spirals of bright coloured 'zippers' wound around them. Teamed with faux ostrich egg beads and a large chunk of sponge coral, they make a light but chunky necklace - another one to go with the summer linen outfits. I found these two shell pendants in a most unlikely place in the house - I think my house elf got fed up of hiding them from me and tossed them out for me to find - I quickly turned them into pieces of jewellery, before he pinched them again. I asked my Facebook fans to help name the one and Minerva's Prize was the name bestowed on it. I called the second one the Whirly Shell Pendant. With both, I have echoed the pattern and shapes in the shells with the wire. I hope you've enjoyed looking at this weeks 'makes' - catch you next week, same time, same place - have a fabulous week
Hello readers, I hope you are all feeling better than I am today - Mike and I have had the flu for nearly two weeks now - I had a week off work and spent Easter in bed. But, things are looking up now, and I am looking forward to the weekend. This whole week I stayed warm in my armchair, making little bits and bobs with wire and beads. CasablancaThe Islamic origins of these Moroccan beads are obvious - they come from a shop in Casablanca, as do these pictures of the Hassan II Mosque. The amazonite slab nuggets in this piece are cut in such a way that when strung, it gives an illusion of there being two strands of beads - a very clever way to cut the stones, as two strands of these undoubtedly beautiful gemstones would be too heavy - and expensive! The Butterfly's WeddingI acquired a pendant made of a sheet of mother-of-pearl from my friend BN, and it lay around the house for a while, my house elf moved it from spot to spot - until one day, I decided to make something with it before the elf 'disappeared' it forever! I sat down with it one evening, and played with wire - I meant to cover over the brown markings on the edge of the pendant - to my mind, they marred what would otherwise be a pretty, shiny sheet of MOP. But by the time I was done, I had used the entire pendant as a backing sheet for a profusion of leaves, vines, and tendrils in a fanciful garden populated by crystal butterflies. The piece reminded me of a fairy tale by Hans Christian Andersen called 'The Butterfly' - you can read it if you have the time and want to find out what happened - just click on the link - it is the story of a butterfly who was looking for a bride, and the most famous quote from that tale is “Just living is not enough, said the butterfly, one must have sunshine, freedom and a little flower for company.” CapriI've been experimenting with using donuts as focal beads, held in an asymmetric wire weave, which is harder than you might think. These donuts have no aperture where the wire may be passed vertically through them - the central hole has to accommodate the wire, which has to pass through it gracefully, and yet securely. I tried out yet another method, using approximately four feet of the heavier gauge wire, and twenty feet of the fine weaving wire - and another evening bit the dust! The stone here is a blue agate geode with druzy, which is a coating of fine crystals on the stone fracture surface, in the centre. More Earrings and a GiveawayAlthough I felt better with each day, I hadn't the strength to summon my muse and put her to work - I felt as if I was chasing her all around the room, and boy, was she eluding me. I gave up in disgust, and made some earrings with ideas I had had earlier, but just not executed yet. My mother turned 87 on the 22nd - she is fit and well - in fact she's fitter than I am - she walks on a treadmill every day for an hour, and takes painting lessons, to which she has to climb two flights of stairs. On that day, I felt well enough to want to play with clay, and although I didn't spend too much time in my craft room, I managed to make these little sweetpeas, and turned them into earrings that evening. I decided to host a giveaway - yes I know the last one was a disaster, logistics wise, but what can I say, I'm a glutton for punishment. So, the earrings are on Facebook till Sunday the 27th - all people are required to do is to like them and share the image on their page - I will draw the five people who win the earrings from a random number generator. That's me for this week folks, thanks for stopping by, have a great week and I'll catch you next Friday, same time, same place
xx Good day to you readers, I trust you have all had a great week. I certainly have - but more about that later. People in the UK awoke to find a fine covering of dust all over their clean cars this week - a sandstorm in the Sahara desert had picked up fine particles of sand and blown them all the way overland to us, and a light rain had deposited them on cars and other stationary objects. People had loads of fun writing on car windows - the favourite witticism was 'I wish my wife was as dirty as this' and the newspapers coined a new term 'Sandageddon'! It seemed just right that I should make 'Dune' - a little pendant I made out of a composite or Intarsia cabochon and wire work. Derived from the Latin word Intersere, meaning 'to insert', Intarsia is a form of marquetry in wood or stone. The composite is made of a number of pieces of stone, each one cut and faceted to fit exactly into an adjoining piece. Sometimes areas of the pattern are raised to create more depth. Once the individual pieces are complete, they are fitted together like a jig-saw puzzle and fixed to a stone backing which is sometimes cut to the outline shape of the image like a border. The cabochon in the piece above contains jasper and amazonite, surrounded by onyx and marble. As the cabochon is a work of art in itself, I framed it simply, with wire curls embellished with turquoise and coral. The artisan who cut the jasper and amazonite to fit the pendant probably had a picture like this one I took in the Sinai desert last year in his mind's eye. The amazonite sky in the pendant has to my eye, the beginnings of a sandstorm, due to a smudge like marking in the amazonite - but I'll bet the artisan who cut it didn't imagine this uniquely British reaction to a sandstorm. I saw this van in the car park of my local supermarket and was compelled to take this picture. I wonder what his wife thought when she read that?? The wire frame was antiqued and embellished with a little wire rose containing a red coral at the top right corner and turquoise beads down one side. I had a fabulous birthday - I was treated to a long weekend at the Savoy in London as part of a theatre break - we saw The Jersey Boys which I enjoyed very much, ate our weight in food and sweets, wandered hand in hand like young foolish things (ageing by the minute) in Covent Garden and the West End, met friends, had drinks at the American Bar, were treated to lunch - all sorts of fabulousness - I hope it was a harbinger of the year to come. What do you give a jewellery maker?? Why, jewellery that she can't/wont make herself, of course. This necklace is from Tibet and is embroidered onto a backing of cloth, with a sash to tie it around the neck - I love it - thank you Michael! The Savoy of course is lush, as one would expect and we enjoyed being waited on hand and foot, and then some. Breakfast, which is a meal I do not usually eat, was a must have and we sat down at the American bar both evenings - their mocktails, and they have but two - the Cucumberland and the Savoy Ice Tea are both to be recommended. We were there at Earth Hour, and the whole place was lit up with fairy tale candles - who needs electricity?? Earth Hour at The Savoy Pearls are in this season as a hot jewellery trend, but I've never really been a pearls person. Being a bit of a trend watcher I have now decided after a bit of soul searching, that actually I do like them, just not in grandmotherly mode - growing old gracefully and wearing age appropriate jewellery - what's that all about?? There are tons of modern ways to wear pearl jewellery - and none of them prissy. I have made it a personal mission to look for different ways to wear pearls and create looks that even the most non grandmotherly Caprilicious woman will love. Baroque or misshapen pearls have a more contemporary look and the design possibilities are endless. In this necklace, I have put together five strands of pearls and interspersed them with raw uncut nuggets of garnet. The clasp is pretty too, and can be worn to one side - it is a blister pearl, which is a pearl still attached to the shell of the oyster. The necklace can be worn twisted into a rope, or with the strands still separate, with the clasp in different positions - on the back, to one side or to the front. Pearls and garnets are a well known combination, the twist in the tale here being the raw nuggets which give the piece its Noir Baroque look. The rest of the week was spent making little earrings while watching television of an evening - I seem to always have a project on the go, and when I don't, making earrings are a fall back way to enjoy an evening! That's all I had time for this week folks, have a good week and I'll catch you next Friday, same time, same place
xx Hello all, I hope you have all had a good week and beat the pre Christmas anxiety bug by getting it all ready beforehand. If you haven't, don't forget, Caprilicious offers a free gift wrap service and your gifts can be sent straight out to your friends from here. Last week was all about bracelets - Neelam Modi, of Look in the Bag kick started this orgy of bracelet making by buying one that I had tucked away somewhere, and almost forgotten about. She sent me this lovely collage, and I decided straight away that I ought to make some more in a similar style, it looked so good on her (she is a graphic designer who conjures up the most beautiful silk scarves with her own designs on them, paired with a little piece of jewellery, all presented in a bag that can be used as an accessory, as well as packaging for the scarf - what a fab gift idea). So I looked around for stuff I could incorporate into this sort of bracelet, and here's what i came up with. The first one is a blue agate geode - not dissimilar to the one on Neelam's wrist - except that one was green. I also used an amethyst flower, and a bronzite flower that I got off my friend BN, in a bead swap. I sat in front of the telly the whole week making nets out of wire - I hope you think all that effort wasn't wasted. Then, I had a phone call from my sister in law who suggested I make some more bracelets in the Chinese Whispers mode - out came the polymer clay and these rolled off the table a few hours later..... Sisters go to TeaI played with the face cane, made a week ago and under instruction from Alice Stroppel, I manipulated the cane so I got three different faces from the same cane - I wouldn't say these ladies are beauties - not by a long chalk, but their faces have character ( is that one way of saying they look like old boots!) and they look like they are related to one another - so, 'Sisters go to Tea' was the title of this little offering - since I still have some face cane left, there may be a 'Sisters...' series forthcoming. I think the bracelet is whimsical and fun, and my sense of humour ensures that I will wear it - what do you think? - do you think it's a fun bracelet or do you prefer you jewellery to be more ornate and conventional/sedate?? I think there's a place for both kinds. For some reason, I was a busy little bee and felt like making a few more pieces - every time I took a break from the wire netting, I made a necklace! MirageKyanite and opalite in different shapes and sizes carry the last of my leaf skeletons. Dyed red and blue jade teardrops were added to the leaf with a wire flourish. I love kyanite, which resembles shards of blue cracked ice, with a shimmer deep inside the stone. The molecules are arranged in sheets or layers, which give the stone it's distinctive shimmer - to me it resembles a mirage. MajorelleThe main colour in the Majorelle gardens in Marrakesh is a cobalt blue, which is vivid and cheerful. At the entrance however, as if the architect wanted to ease you into the brightness, is a restful pond in a very different shade of blue. I named this necklace after the gardens, the blue chalcedony in it is such a restful colour. The yellow agate and creamy jasper provide a calm counterpoint. I know these colours are very summery - but the very drabness of winter makes me want to create in Technicolour - and these days people follow the sun for holidays, so there's no such thing as a seasonally inappropriate colour. Rose GardenA song from my youth - Rose Garden! I made some roses for the Caprilicious birthday giveaway a couple of weeks ago - and I made these two fairly robust, so that they could be used in a necklace - much like the wedding garlands worn by the main protagonists in Indian weddings. Along with an Afghani pendant, the necklace looked pretty festive - I test drove it one evening, to rave reviews! I love that I made almost all the elements myself - in fact all the elements except the pendant and the crystal beads and clasp.
This weekend, I will bring out the tree, and put up all my decorations, get all my presents wrapped up and ready to go, and work at the day job - HELP! At least I've posted off my Christmas cards, so there's one thing crossed off the list. Have a good weekend, and I'll catch you next week, same time, same place xx Hello readers, I hope you've all had a great week. We have had a lovely, sunny and warm Bank Holiday long weekend in the UK, and I have had schoolmates to stay for our annual reunion - more on that later. This inevitably got me thinking of childhood dreams, and taking stock of the reality of adulthood. As a child, I was a very girly girl - I loved jewellery, make up and dressing up and would have liked nothing better than to be a cross between Curly Locks from the nursery rhyme by Mother Goose, and Umrao Jaan - a famous courtesan and poet, whose life story has been immortalised in a couple of Bollywood movies. Of course, thankfully, neither was I beautiful enough to be Umrao Jaan, nor did I write poetry, and as for being Curly Locks............... Oh well, Que Sara Sara! I was too young to understand what Umrao Jaan had to do for a living apart from singing her poetry soulfully and wearing beautiful jewellery. Today, I have a day job that is both prosaic and exciting (how did those two words jump into the same sentence??) and have had a few Umrao Jaan's pass my way as patients - such is life! Besides which, I don't really like strawberries and my sewing skills leave a lot to be desired - I was the bane of the needlework teachers life! I do not wash dishes or feed swine either - that's a no-no in my book, so not all is lost. And of course, we mustn't forget my mother, who would have chased me around Bangalore with a big stick before abandoning me to either the Umrao Jaan or Curly-locks course of action! Aren't these colours exciting?? These are the colours predicted by Pantone, the world authority on colour, to be prominent in design and fashion this autumn. The colours are so bright and vivid - brighter than last years colours, which were just a couple of shades paler, but what a difference that makes! All the clothes in the shops will follow this trend as designers, who are swamped by this imagery will find themselves making stuff in these colours, almost subconsciously picking them for their products. The East Coast DesiDesi [d̪eːsi] is a term for the people, cultures, and products of the Indian subcontinent and their diaspora. India, Bangladesh, Pakistan, and Nepal are some of the countries included In this term. The largest Desi diaspora populations are found in the USA, UK, Canada, South Africa, the Middle East, Australia and South East Asia . Last week, the East Coast Desi, Sruthi Singh featured Caprilicious Jewellery on her blog http://theeastcoastdesi.blogspot.co.uk/2013/08/caprilicious-jewellery-featured-shop.html Sruthi has a lovely home and takes some beautiful photographs of it on her blog, apart from other things that fill her with enthusiasm - I am grateful that Caprilicious Jewellery is one of them - she is just the kind of woman for whom I design - contemporary, fun and feisty, the quintessential Caprilicious Woman! Sruthi says..... 'I'm Sruthi - a mother, wife, artist, and a huge decor enthusiast. I've been a part of the corporate world and worked for the Big Four in accounting. But my heart was always inclined towards the creative field. My son has taught me to stop and smell the roses and devour the smaller moments in life. Decorating his room has led me to opening my online children's art boutique on Etsy called "The Yellow Bamboo". You can check it out right here http://www.etsy.com/shop/theyellowbamboo Thank you very much, Sruthi, that was a great write up for Caprilicious. I discovered Facebook late in life - to look around and see if I could find out what had happened to mates from school, and I must say I was richly rewarded - there are five of us in the UK from my school year - and we have made contact with each other now and meet up at least once a year. This year we met over four days, with people coming and going at their convenience, so I had little time to make jewellery. What was nice was that my friends like my jewellery and took some home with them - I'm a sucker for anyone who likes my jewellery! We ate and drank, swam, sang and danced to our hearts content, and it was worth the effort Mike and I put in to have such a fun time. We will most definitely do it again in August next year, and anyone from our class who wants to come along is welcome. The Emerald Isle CuffThis bracelet was made using wire, a green agate slab nugget and pale green crystals. The green agate is particularly pretty, with markings running through it bringing to mind an atoll in the Indian Ocean. It took two days to weave the fine netting of wire, and I added tiny green crystals at the front of the cuff to add a bit of colour. That's all I had time for this week folks. I am at work on the day job all this weekend and if I have the time, I intend to play with my kiln again - am keeping my fingers crossed that I will have something to show for it at the end of all my hard work.
Have a fab week and I will catch you later, same time, same place xx Hello readers, I trust you have all had a good week. The flowers are a-blooming and everything looks so pretty when we walk into our garden or drive around town. The warmth of the unaccustomed summer sun in the UK has brought out the romantic in me and this mood has touched all that I have made this week. I had a bunch of coloured baroque pearls and I strung them onto mono filament invisible nylon, using jeweller's glue to get them to stay in place. Of course, the nylon had a mind of it's own, so did the pearls, and as for the glue - let's not even go there - a few newly invented swear words later, this necklace appeared - my husband wondered whether I was developing Tourette's syndrome and I had to take time out to reassure him that it was all for real and the air around me wasn't blue due to a psychiatric disorder. I had to prise my fingers apart after soaking them in warm water to take some pictures of my latest creation. Anyway, it was all worth it in the end, and I can present Summer Holiday............... This is an ideal piece to carry away on holiday, light and pretty, and with so many colours, it will go with anything - Summer Holiday seemed apt. The next piece was almost to claw back the now distant memory of our holiday in the spring, and Peter Cincotti's rendition of I Love Paris says it all. Romance was firmly back on the agenda. Shiny heart shaped Czech glass beads, little crystals and rose quartz wired onto a torque sit around the neck in this piece like a garland of flowers. I didn't put any crystals at the back of the necklace - the stiffness of the torque would cause the wired flowers and leaves to dig the wearer in the neck - who wants that in the heat of a warm summer evening, when this piece should really float elegantly around the neck? Not me, that's who! Peacock from the Ocean Abalone or Paua is a snail, found in temperate waters around the world from the genus Haliotis ( no, not Halitosis - pay attention now!), meaning 'sea - ear'. It has a flattish shell, which is dull on the outside, and beautifully coloured on the inside, with a mother of pearl nacre. The snail has a strong foot, and clings to a rock surface on the ocean bed, and has to be prised off - this can be extremely difficult, and I was surprised to read that divers have perished in the attempt. "Abalone grip so hard that unless you catch one by surprise, you are unable to pry it off the basin. Divers used to drown while collecting abalone . . . a diver would pry an abalone loose, stick his fingers under the shell to lift it and then in surprise and pain when the ab clamps down would drop his ab bar. At that point, there would be no way to get his hand loose and he would drown. (Tank diving is illegal when gathering abalone.)" This is called the 'Abalone's Revenge'. One question - how does one catch an abalone by surprise?? - there is no mention of this anywhere - maybe you have to leap out at it from behind a rock, all guns blazing?? Clint Eastwood, eat your heart out! Abalone Sashimi Red Abalone are harvested mainly for the Sushi restaurant trade - males and females are put into large tanks on moonlit nights ( they prefer to mate on full moon nights), with soft violin music, candlelight, and a bottle of wine (yes, joke!). An Abalone Farm - a far cry from 'bring on the violins'! They produce baby abalones, which are collected and given a diet of kelp smoothies and snail spaghetti, which is a slurry of bran, seaweed and other nutrients made into a dough, extruded through a pasta machine and baked, to help them grow till they are large enough to be eaten. The shells are used for jewellery, but have to be ground and polished by experts as the dust is very toxic, and causes lung diseases. No wonder then, the shells are expensive - however, the colours are so beautiful, I am sure you will agree it is worth all that trouble. I made a polymer clay ruffle bead in abalone colours, and put a necklace together. The colours are gorgeous and I could only hope that my ruffle bead would be up to the task of complementing the abalone shell beads - what do you think?? WILD This necklace, made with crystals and diamante encrusted spacers, has been one of Caprilicious' more successful designs. It has been reproduced in quite a few colours, and at the jewellery party at my friends place, the hostess picked it up almost immediately - when she showed it off to her friends, they fell in love with it, and I had orders for the same piece, having asked her permission first, of course. I sent off for strings of crystals and spacers and clasps, and I made the first of the necklaces on order this week. Fortunately, I have the design and the suppliers written down, and this is one of the few that can actually be remade. That's about all I have had time for this week folks, it looks like another scorcher here in the UK over the weekend. Have fun, and I will catch up with you next week, same time, same place xx |
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