Jezebel, by Caprilicious Jewellery

Hello folks, thanks for coming back for another squiz at Caprilicious. This coming week is our birthday week and I'm ever so happy to report that I've enjoyed every minute of the eight years that we've been around. Here are the couple of necklaces I made last week.

Jezebel

A roundly-despised and unfairly-maligned seductress of the bible who ran afoul of the priests, Jezebel, along with her husband Ahab, instituted the worship of the 'false God' Baal. In addition, she violently purged the prophets of Yahweh from Israel, damaging the reputation of the Omride Dynasty. For these offences, the Omride Dynasty was annihilated, with Jezebel herself suffering the gruesome death of defenestration, which basically means that they chucked her, kicking and screaming out of a window and her body was eaten by dogs!
Jezebel wore loads of jewellery, makeup, and henna tattoos on her hands - so was quite contemporary, then. She wore a lot of purple, which would have come from a dye her homeland was known for producing.  This single fact remained in my mind for some reason (and also I like bad girls!), and when this necklace was done, it screamed 'Jezebel!!!' to me.
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Last But Not The Least - Aventurine Rose

Last week I told you about this little series of necklaces I've been making from left over and orphan beads. I made another using a carved aventurine rose, raw hemimorphite nuggets and carnelian.

I love how the colour combination of burnt sugar and pale blue turned out - I must have put them together subconsciously as I'd saved the leftover beads in a single plastic baggie. The rose was an afterthought, recently found in the depths of my bead stash.

The next piece was commissioned, and built around a little silver pendant from Jaipur with garnets, iolite and peridot. I have no doubt it will be well loved.

 So, as I said, it's been eight years - when I originally sought out teachers to help me understand the technical aspects of jewellery making, so that I could actually create something with a professional finish, I knew nothing of design.
​ At the classes I took, most of the students arrived with an idea of what they wanted to make and took home a piece that they had created. I, on the other hand had (and still have) a number of half finished 'samplers' that taught me technique, but nothing about design. I've had to pick that up myself - colours, shapes, odd-ball elements and the materials themselves seem to fall into place uncannily  -  this learning process has been inspirational, and has given me a sense of excitement that continues to build with time. These are some of my very first pieces - people actually paid for them, the ones that went before were given away as gifts. My first attempt at writing a blog was titled imaginatively 'Week 1'!!
​I paid for the domain name on the 21st of November, and we mark this as Caprilicious' birthday.

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At the beginning of this adventure, I told myself “Never make anything you would not wear yourself.”  I have remained true to that principle as I search for stones and accents.  My work is an expression of my wide range of tastes, my love of color and sense of adornment.  My greatest joy is to see one of my necklaces or earrings on someone who wears them well and loves them.  I am constantly on the “hunt” for the best of materials and find that I cannot compromise in quality.  I would rather make one piece that is outstanding, rather than try to produce several that bring me only lukewarm results.   
As I continue to grow in my design sense, I find that my life long development of “hand skills’, fascination with tools and gadgets, attention to detail and love of creation itself have captivated me and I hope to go on for a long while yet.
​Thank you all for being with me on my magic carpet, I am very grateful.

To mark our birthday, Caprilicious and I would like to offer you a little gift, a £ off for every year of our existence. Pop the code HappyBirthday into your checkout for an £8 discount on anything you wish to pick up for the next two weeks, ending the 1st of November. 
That's me for this week, folks. Have a fabulous week and I'll catch you next Friday, same time,same place.
Until then
​xx