Friday, May 27, 2011

A Glutton for Punishment Part II



In truth I had placed my last blog posting into drafts until I had completed this complicated necklace as there were many days between where I left this project and its ultimate completion.
As was mentioned in my last post, I'm either a glutton for punishment or crazy as I put a small fortune and way more time than I should have into creating this piece. In the previous installment of "A Glutton for Punishment" we left my black and white project at about this point in its progress towards completion (see Photo below).
  Photo below...Since then much has been added.
I decided to use the sweet little, jet black glass hearts as single dangles instead of coupling them with the silver glass leaves. If you look closely you might be able to see the jet hearts topped with tiny 3 mm firepolished crystals and micro 2mm beads of hematite. Instead of the black glass hearts the silver leaf dangles received small swirled wire charms that I made myself (see photo below for close-up). It worked out well, or at least I'm satisfied with the results.

You probably don't remember (I certainly didn't expect you to that's for sure) that I mentioned my project had to be put on hold yet another time as I required some type of link to add the side of the necklace. Not just any old link, I needed something special and found it in this hammered textured rhodium finished oval link. Perfection !!!

Personally I like the way this link helps tie the elaborate center section to the sides of the necklace but I realize this is a matter of taste.
 
The other side is attached by way of a link that I made using a large black glass bead and a couple of pretty bead caps, making sure that the wire loops were sufficiently large. A sand dollar charm was added as a counter weight to the large link and as an element of interest.

This side of the necklace also sports some whimsical hand coiled spirals and an assortment of stacked or capped black and white beads.

 
The side with the spirals, ends with a hook style clasp that I made using 20 gauge wire (doubled) and embellished with a complimentary black (slightly wire wrapped) bead.
 
The other side of the necklace features a fair sized cable chain to accommodate the clasp. A cute teardrop white bead is used as an end to the extension chain and is adorned with contrasting black beads and that really cute bead cap (love these caps!).

Photos below show the completed necklace.  Perhaps I fell into Alice's rabbit burrow and went a little too far with the whimsy but to be honest this piece never truly followed my carefully drawn plans, instead it seemed to tell me what to do and, even though it was a long time in the making and created a lot more work than I ever imagined, I'm grateful that I listened to it. 

Unfortunately the stacks of black beads look like one continuous bead in my photos, I tried making them (the photos, not the beads) lighter and though that made the individual beads recognizable it also washed out everything else  ... so I settled for what appears to look like big long black beads which are in reality really either 3 to 5 beads stacked together.  Ah the joys of photography.



8 comments:

  1. Wow!! That is some piece. I admire your "glutton for punishment" ;-) as it turns out some amazing work!!! I love the little sand dollar in there...you are right it adds a very interesting element. Beautiful!

    Have a fantastic long weekend!

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  2. Hi Anna!!! Blogspot in not letting me comment for some reason : P I wrote a whole reply and now it's gone ARRRRRRGH....sigh...well this is gorgeous - I love the wrapping and happy cheerful beads - everytime I look at it there is something else to notice! How do you get that wire to turn?

    ...and to answer your other question I have taken to disk cleaning /defrag/ clearing my cache every 3-4 days to make uploading easier. There are some blogs I only go to once in awhile because it takes sooo long to upload their info : P Have a happy and safe weekend!!!

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  3. Hi Anon - :)
    Yes Blogger has been having hiccups today, wish they'd get it straighten out.
    The spirals wire coils were made using a tool called The Artistic Wire Wrapper, unfortunately it is no longer being manufactured but sometimes one can find it on obscure little websites. It was a good tool but they needed to provide people with good tutorials and projects. So inevitably it didn't get the market the way The Wire Gizmo did.
    Thanks for your answer, I'll try clearning out my stash more often than once a week and see if that helps any. But I think you're right and it is just the blog site ... it takes a while to download all the ads, gadgets, widgets etc. :)

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  4. Love the spirals! I wish I could do wirework, but I can't even get a loop on a headpin correct!

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  5. WOW! You may be a glutton for punishment, but the result is nothing but fabulous. I love how you changed your plan partway through and made those swirled charms to go with the leaves. They definitely add some additional depth to your necklace - besides the fact I love swirls :)

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  6. It was worth the effort! Just lovely! I knew you had used the Artistic wire worker because I made exactly those types of coils for a necklace I just completed!

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  7. Oh my, I'm just in awe! I know what you mean about the piece talking to you and turning out different than you planned....happens to me quite frequently with my sewing projects! This piece is just gorgeous! :)

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  8. That is a really gorgeous creation. Congratulations. What a lot of work and creativity.

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