In The Pursuit of Happiness

Hello readers, how are you- I hope you've been enjoying the sunshine - we certainly have in the UK. Wirework and beads have been my friends this week - it has been difficult to tear myself away from the sunshine and go in to work, and I have spent whatever time I could spare sitting in the garden and playing with them. 
I saw some aerial pictures on Pinterest and I was inspired to recreate them in polymer clay, on the one rainy day we had at the weekend. Elysian Fields is a series of pendants inspired by these photographs which I then made up into necklaces.

Elysian Fields

The Elysian Fields are beautiful meadows in Greek mythology where the favored of Zeus enjoy perfect happiness and where they compose poetry, sing, dance, and tend to their chariots according to Homer - that's the best the ancients could think of when they imagined perfect happiness?!?
 The Parisians named the Avenue des Champs-Élysées  after this mythical place ( more like Elysium, in my opinion and you can get more there than singing and mending chariots) - and anyone who has visited it will agree that it is truly one of the most beautiful avenues in the world - but you will need loads of money to find happiness there.

California Wetlands by Bioflyer on Flickr

Paddy Fields in Yunan from Getty Images

Chaloos Road Iran - image from Travel world CN

Luxor

The Souk in Luxor

I found the scarab, which is the focal piece in this pendant in the souk in Luxor when I went on a Nile Cruise. The scarab beetle was worshipped by the ancient Egyptians and thought to represent Khepri, the early morning manifestation of the sun god Ra, from an analogy between the beetle's behaviour of rolling a ball of dung across the ground and Khepri's task of rolling the sun across the sky.

Scarab necklace - Luxor

The turquoise blue of the scarab was offset by the grey and yellow of the wooden beads I found in India and the coral and turquoise beads I sourced from Nepal.

Mayan Steps

This is the Temple of Kukulkan in Mexico, also known as El Castillo. The stepped pyramids, temples, columned arcades, and other stone structures of Chichén Itzá were sacred to the Mayans from A.D. 750 to 1200. There are 365 steps, one for every day of the year. 

Incredibly, twice a year on the spring and autumn equinoxes, a shadow falls on the pyramid in the shape of a serpent. As the sun sets, this shadowy snake descends the steps to eventually join a stone serpent head at the base of the great staircase up the pyramid’s side.

I am in love!!!!

I happened upon bismuth - this is a metal which one can buy in lump form, and when heated and cooled, it forms a step like iridescent structure, with the light dancing across it's surface.  Bismuth is naturally a silvery-white color as a fresh crystal but acquires it's colorful, iridescent surface  on oxidation of it's surface. 

The stepped structure of a bismuth crystal is the result of a higher growth rate around the outside edges which generates an electrical charge activating crystal growth to a higher degree than on the inside edges.

Levitating a magnet - A Maglev

 It is the only element that has been successfully converted into gold by Nobel laureate Niels Seaborg of Berkeley University in California.
 It is diamagnetic - it repels both the North and South pole equally, and can levitate a magnet. It is the only metal that contracts on heating!

But more, much more than this, it is beautiful and lends itself to wire wrapping. There aren't too many artisans making this type of jewellery - some attach a bail using glue, this is the only other way it can be suspended - it shatters like glass on drilling it.

Sourcing some for Caprilicious became something of a quest/ treasure hunt - I got my crystals from a UK source for ease of delivery, and so I wouldn't have to pay exorbitant postage / customs duty, and couldn't wait to make them up into pendants.

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The back

The back

They are just as pretty on the back as they are from the front, and shine with an unearthly glow - I just love them. On simple leather necklaces, they are sure to attract attention.

Swarovski Rivoli Pendants

Swarovski Rivolis

Swarovski makes these beautiful crystals, with a faceted top and a pointy back - they are fairly flat and are usually set in bezels that can be purchased in bead shops or handmade beaded girdles. Nicole Hanna decided to set a challenge to wire wrap these Rivolis - she issued half a tutorial and left us to finish the piece without too much addition or subtraction, even the tools were specified - all the contestants received the finished tutorial as a gift for participating. I had never set a Rivoli before, but am not averse to a challenge, so I gave it a go.
The main engineering difficulty was to secure the crystal securely to the wire bezel without the use of glue, prongs or any such elements, while keeping the design interesting, of course. I made a few of these, and the last one with the tutorial, as envisaged by our host, Ms Hanna.

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Rivoli pendant

Black Rivoli pendant

Emerald green Rivoli pendant

The back

The back

Blue Rivoli Pendant

Tanzanite Rivoli pendant

And finally, this was the pendant made from the finished tutorial provided to all the entrants. You can find the other entries here.

And that's all I had time for, folks - I hope you enjoyed your visit with Caprilicious and come back next week, same time, same place. Have a great week in the meantime
xx