Thursday, October 7, 2010

Scales, Skeletons and Eyes, Oh My! (It must be Halloween!)

Halloween might very well be my favorite holiday, and I've been up to a lot of fun, creepy things at my studio lately! First off, I made some of my shop staples, like pendants and earrings, in orange, purple, and black. There's even a "candy corn" version of my chain earrings in stock right now!

I also recently got 2 supply shipments: One contained the necessary ring sizes I needed to start making scale flowers! The name sounds a little creepy, but they're very cute!

You can see about 20 of them here, in different colors. I'm still working on ways to use these guys. I attached 2 to barrette clips as prototypes. I've been wearing them all week to make sure they're secure & will stand up to normal wear (& I've gotten a ton of compliments on them, too!) So far, so good!

There's also a prototype for scale bracelets at the top there. I LOVE mine, the scales stand up when you wear it, like spikes! But its loosely woven enough that the scales will just slide out of the way rather than catch on to things. I'm planning to have both of these up in time for the holidays (because, actually, as a shop owner I'm VERY behind on the holiday thing, I think a lot of serious Artisan businesses already have a sizable stock ready to go)

Now for the other supply shipment, which is a lot more in the Halloween spirit and I'm really excited about: Skull Cameos!

These are just the first 2, I actually purchased a dozen in different color combinations. I found great ring color matches for most of them, and the epoxy is curing on them now. The half-persian chains I wrapped them in are tight enough to stay on on their own, but with enough wiggling/pushing the piece will pop out, so I'm making them extra secure with some epoxy glue designed for metals and jewelry.

I only got a few of these cameos, and in only one design, to try it out. I think they turned out really cool, and if they sell out I'll be sure to grab a bunch more! (also, sorry, but I'm keeping the black/red one in the picture. It just matches my Renn Faire costume so perfectly! That's a problem with making things to sell, sometimes I love my stuff so much I want to keep it for myself! But I can totally find & make another if someone really wants one.)

Trying out pendant-wrapping techniques reminded me of something I stowed away for a long time. I had a crazy idea last summer to paint flat-backed domed glass pieces, and bezel set them into brooches. The best thing I could find to paint on was....
Eyes! Clear taxidermy eyes, to be exact! I don't remember the exact type of animal eye this was supposed to be. Alligator, maybe, or some kind of fish. Anyway, it was really fun to imagine these as Dragon eyes, and coloring/designing them around different types of dragons (see why my profile says I'm nerdy?). I'm working on chain-wrapped settings for a few of these, I'd like them to look like talismans made from the spoils of hunted mythical beasts! Still working on that, though, but its fun and kind of festive to have eyes floating around my desk this month.

Will keep checking in this month, but right now I'm off to go brainstorm designs for my jack o'lanturn!

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