An Unusual Necklace

Can't believe it's a week since I last posted; the days are just flying by and, frustratingly, I've not had a lot of time to sneak off into my "craft room" (AKA the spare room) to do much art ..... and as for the speed Christmas is approaching, I daren't even think about that ...... I'm really not organised at all (I think I get less organised every year)!

Anyhow, it's an early start in the morning for me as I'm off to the Knitting & Stitching Show at Harrogate with a friend - the coach picks us up from the centre of town at 8.15am.  I've not been to many shows this year, but this one has to be one of my favourites - there are so many stands to visit (and spend money at) as well as lots of interesting exhibitions.  It's quite a challenge to get round it all and have a good look at everything before it's time to catch the coach home again.  I've got a sort of list to take with me of a few bits and pieces that I'd like to buy, but if I'm true to form, I won't stick to it at all and will end up buying something entirely different! 

I plan to wear this piece of jewellery tomorrow and I wonder if any of you know what the centre piece is made of (or maybe you've seen it before ...... I was commissioned to create a necklace using this unusual "cabochon" by the UK "Bead" magazine a year or two back).  The colours weren't ones I normally would have selected to use together - the bright reds and blues - but I had some large dyed fossil beads in these colours in my stash and they were perfect for what I envisaged.  Part of the necklace was created using Zulu Stitch and the cabochon was embellished with clusters of pearly shells.  The necklace is reversible as the patterning on the cabochon is different on either side.

Well, did you guess yet?

Can you believe that it's actually made of CAR PAINT?  It's called Fordite (of course, what else?!) and was only available in limited quantities.  Apparently, it's composed of layers of car paint retrieved from an old car manufacturing site which were compressed together to create these amazing swirly patterns.  It's also a very light material so extremely comfortable to wear.

Finally, if any of you are interested in creating chunky books and want to learn a little more about the process, then pop over to Treez Malyon's blog where she's running a very thorough tutorial on a Marie Antoinette book she's creating.  It's very inspiring and might whet your appetite for having a go at making one yourself in the New Year!

A Little Bit of "Eye Candy" !

Okay, so as requested, here are some of my beaded jewellery pieces.  As you can see, I have a particular love of using semi-precious stone cabochons, agates, crystals and pearls in my work.

This necklace has a piece of nephrite jade for the centrepiece, with a spiral ladder strap and a few "dangles".  I added rows of beads across the front of the stone for both decoration and added security. 

Turquoise is one of my favourite colours so I really loved the way this piece turned out.  I surrounded an agate slice with rows of peyote stitched beadwork, added lots of branched fringing (to give the effect of seaweed) and a soapstone dolphin across the front of the agate piece.  The strap is a double spiral ladder, with a mermaid shaped fastener, and the agate pendant can be slid off the necklace giving you two alternative looks.

The next two pieces of jewellery were created around one of my absolute favourite stones, Ocean Jasper, which is mostly if not solely found in the waters off the coast of Madagascar.  It has a wonderful dreamy quality to it. 

The first of the pics shows an ocean jasper cabochon enclosed in beads with chunky peyote spiral straps.  I used matte metallic bronze, olive and cream beads in a variety of shapes and sizes, as well as some bronze potato pearls, to create this piece.  It's very comfortable to wear.

The second piece is called "Sea Breeze" and I created this piece a few years ago for one of the themed display boards that accompany The Beadworkers Guild stand at various craft and bead fairs around the country.  I chose a gorgeous slightly irregular-shaped piece of ocean jasper for the centrepiece - it has an almost hypnotic quality about it and it made me think of lapping ocean waves against a shell-strewn shoreline, very peaceful, it's quite a meditative piece and one of my personal favourites.  I've used mother-of-pearl chips and a couple of jade beads as well as seed beads in a range of sizes, creating an assymetrical look by the use of a variety of spirals.

The last necklace I'm posting a pic of tonight is this purple-maroon agate stone.  I made the strap for this first, using a string of glass pearl beads, which were completely netted over with Delica beads, when I was away on a "beady" weekend at Alston Hall, Longridge.  When I returned home I had a root through my stash and came across this agate which perfectly matched the colours I'd used to make the netted strap, so of course it had to form the centre of the pendant.  I added a fringe of dagger drops and embellished the top of the pendant with lots of glass flowers.

Well, I hope you liked this glimpse of "eye candy" and I'll post more another time.