Bracelets

I have been making a lot of these bracelets lately.  They are quick andeasy to make and there are a lot of variations so it can be more personal.  I made the one with the cross for a fewlittle girls as a first communion gift earlier this year.  They are the perfect gift, it’s thetype of thing you could wear daily, on its own or with other bracelets. 

Triangle Necklace

Recently I had the privilege ofteaching a six-week jewelry course at a local middle school.  I went over the basics with them,sawing, soldering and bezel making. It was a lot of fun! For their final project they were to make any pieceof jewelry with a stone setting to display the skills they had learned.  This was the piece I made as an exampleso I could show them how to set stones. I am very pleased with the way it turned out.  I love the negative space; it has inspired me to incorporatenegative space in some of my newer pieces.  I also used a cabochon stone, because I thought it would beeasier for the kids to set.  I wasn’tsure about the stone at first because I mostly work with faceted stones but Ithink the cabochon works well with this piece. 

I feel like I am experiencing this right now.   I find myself getting frustrated or disappointed with the pieces I am making.  I just don't know where exactly I am going wrong.  I get really excited about the design or idea of a piece but once I'm finished making it I don't like it at all.  I don't know if I'm falling short in the execution of the piece or the design was just bad to begin with.  It's just upsetting because I want to have another show but I am not proud of any of the pieces I have made recently and I don't think it's fair to try and make money from them.  

Texas Ring

This is my new Texas ring.  I originally wanted to do a stone for each city - Houston, Austin, Dallas, San Antonio, and El Paso but I thought it looked too cluttered.  I chose these cities because they are the most well known and the largest in Texas - sorry but Fort Worth is the same as Dallas in my book.  The lines depict different highways (45, 10, and 71).  The stone moves along the "highways" to the different cities.  I love this ring because I love Texas.  It is a very simple ring but not small.  This is not a ring you could wear if you had to use your hands at all, it would definitely get in your way.

Sofia's Necklace

  This necklace I designed with a little six year old I used to babysit.  She came up with the stone hanging from the chain.  Which is so funny to me because it fits in with my style of jewelry so well.  I love unexpected movement in my pieces.  I oxidized the inside of the diamond shape to make the stone pop even more.  I love the movement I  get working with the really small chain but I always forget how much of a pain it is.  I have gotten better with it but I still melt the chain at least once every time.  But overall I love the necklace and I hope I can find someone that would love to have it.   

Scrap Necklace

This is what I like to call a scrap necklace.  I really liked the shape of this scrap piece of silver I had and I thought it would make a really cool necklace.  Of course I had to do a little more to it to make it interesting so I added texture and then oxidized the texture so it would stand out.  I also put a small amethyst in the corner to bring some color to the piece.  I think the purple and the black together make it look a little Gothic(not in a good way) but I love the way it hangs on the neck.  As with most of my pieces, it has a very geometric look to it - sloppy geometric.  Sorry the photo is so bad.

Mother of Pearl Earrings

I really like working with mother of pearl and I thought it would be a lot easier than it was to work with the chain.  I had to melt about three chains before I could get to this point, but I guess the more I work with it the easier it will get.  These are very simple, almost boring, earrings.  But they look beautiful on the ears and the movement of the chain really catches the eye.

Heart Necklace

This is a pretty simple necklace. Similar to other necklaces I have made the solid heart threads through the wire heart.  So the length of the necklace is somewhat adjustable, you could have the solid heart hang longer or have the two hang side by side.  I don't know why I am drawn to this style of necklace so much but I love the simplicity of it.   

  

This is a bracelet that I made to honor my grandmother who recently passed away.  When I went to visit her in the hospital we had talked about me making this bracelet.  It is really her design but it fits so well with my style.  I am so happy I was able to make it and have something to wear to remember her by.  

My work at SCAD

I have been at SCAD 6 quarters now and last quarter was the first time I was able to take a major related course - Studio 1.  I still don't know how sure I am about perusing this career through SCAD but I wanted to share the projects that we did in Studio 1.

Our first project was to learn how to use the hydraulic press and make a pair of earrings using that technique.  I wasn't really excited about this project because I had learned how to use this tool in high school and I never like the way it made pieces look.  So naturally,  I put off this project until the day before it a due and then I was racing to finish.  That is a theme throughout all the pieces here.  But that is why it looks so sloppy.  I think the shape is interesting and it works well with the shape of the face when they are on, but there are plenty of errors too.

Next we were learning geometric designs and making tubes and cones and tube setting stones. So this is my three-finger geometric ring.  Again there were some problems with this ring.  When I turned it in both stones fell out of the tubing, but my professor showed me how to fix it.  It's a little bit too big for me and I don't think I could sell it, but I had a lot of fun making it.  

In the bracelet project we learned how to make hinges which I think ended up being a traumatic experience for the entire class.  It was also nearing the end of the quarter and everyone was exhausted and stressed already.  The day we had to turn the project in I was very unhappy with mine and was embarrassed to show it to the class.  I really like the silhouette of it and I think it has the potential of being a really cool bracelet.  But the craftsmanship is so bad and I know I can do so much better than this.        

This last project we had to make a hollow construction ring and a box for it.  I was not too excited about this project either.  It was the end of the quarter and I just wanted to get it over with.  The craftsmanship on this is so much better, I wanted to make up for the embarrassment of the bracelet. Other than the craftsmanship there is not much I like about this ring.  I don't even think I would try to sell this because I don't think it is a good reflection of myself.  

My First Solo Show

August 27th 2011 was the day of my first show.  I meant to use this blog to get the word out about it, write updates about how everything is going through out the summer.  But that didn't really workout so I'm doing it now.  I had it in a friends home, just set up on one table(above).  It was very low-key only about 20 or 25 people showed up, mostly family members.   It was a great day, even though I had stayed up the entire night before trying to get everything ready and was struggling to stay awake during the show.  It was three hours long and I had 35 pieces for sale.  I ended up selling a little over half of my pieces which was really exciting.   I have added some pictures of the jewelry.  I'm sorry for the bad quality of pictures I completely forgot my camera and had to use my phone.

Heart Necklace

This is a necklace that I made for a friend to give to his girlfriend.  I really like this style of necklace because there is no clasp, the smaller heart goes through the larger heart.  I'm happy with the way this piece turned out.  I know you can't really tell from these pictures but I like the texture I put on the hearts.   It is a bit more time consuming than other textures I could have done but it turned out well and I think I will use it on pieces in the future.

Texas Pride

I find myself inspired by all things Texas.  Seeing the small towns and the dirt roads as well as the big cities.  I love it all and it makes me so excited to create jewelry that expresses that.