a wrapturous blog

YOJ10-15 Knotted Earrings 3

Knotted Earrings 3 (2010)
Sterling silver, fine silver, tourmaline
Constructed, cold-joined
L 3.7 cm x W 0.5 cm (W 1.45″ x L 0.2″)

Continuing on from last week, since I made several of the Monkey’s Fist knots, I made another pair of earrings!

I’ve been doing some experimenting with photography lately, putting my pieces on a white background instead of the medium gray.  I’m looking for ways to make the images “pop” more – in my recent work I’ve been using a lot of stones that have the same value as the background, and it makes the jewellery look dull.  “Value” in colour terms refers to how light or dark it is.  (To see check the value of your stone, stare at the photo with squinted eyes – if the stone disappears it has the same value as the background.)  In order for a photo to have visual interest, it has to be either lighter or darker than the background, otherwise the eyes see what’s there, but the brain registers “ho hum”.

It’s a bit more work to deal with a white background – inevitably, and even though I have a white balance setting on my camera – the raw photo comes out slightly grey.  Photoshop can adjust the balance it easily, but then I usually still have to do some extra clean up.  It’s a bit tricky to lighten the background enough to get rid of “noise” but not so much that the jewellery bleaches out.

From a print perspective, (putting on my editor hat for a moment), getting photos with white background is a godsend for layout.  I can plunk them down anywhere on a page and build text around them.  Or I can crop and put several images close together – something that isn’t possible when the jewellery is shot on a grey or staged background.   There are no distractions – you look at the jewellery and nothing else.

While they work for print and web, white backgrounds do *not* work well for jury photos.  I had the opportunity to sit in on a jury for a show recently (something I highly recommend BTW, it’s very educational), and I noticed that the photos with white backgrounds were always very jarring.  Backgrounds with a value of medium to dark (but not black) and *absolutely no props* worked best for jury photos.  Prop shots work well for Etsy, but are distracting in jury.

More photos:

Tags: bead, bridal, cold connections, cold joining, constructed, dianne karg baron, earring, earrings, etsy, fine silver, green, jewellery, jewelry, macrame, photography, silver, sterling silver, tourmaline, wire, wire jewellery, wire jewelry, wirework, wireworking, Year of Jewelry Project

YOJ10-14 Knotted Earrings 2

Knotted Earrings 2 (2010)
Sterling silver, iolite
Constructed, cold-joined
L 2.5 cm x W 0.7 cm (L 0.98″ x W 0.275″)

My life is all about choices:  if I choose to focus on one area of my life, another area gets sacrificed.  For the past few weeks, I’ve had to focus on some group endeavours, and so my work on YOJ projects ground to a halt.  I’m working towards finding balance, but haven’t found it just yet.

For this week’s project, my focus was on making bridal jewellery.  My thoughts were on “something blue” and “tying knots”.

The Monkey’s Fist is a classic macramé knot, usually used as a weight or ornament on the end of a rope.  Tying them in rope is relatively easy.  When I learned it as a child, it was just a matter of sticking a marble between two fingers, and wrapping the rope around the marble and fingers, then around the marble through fingers and then through the loops created by the fingers.  Then the loops were pulled tight.

In wire, the stiffness of the metal, and its tendency to kink makes tying challenging.  There is also the issue of trying to get the proportions right:  thinner gauge wire is more flexible to tie, but the knot becomes very small and fiddly.  I found it impossible to tie wire around a bead without it slipping all over the place.  Pulling the loops tight at the end was also a non-starter, so I had to make the initial wraps as close to round as possible – challenging since without a bead in the centre, the tendency is to wrap ovals.  I ended up creating an invent-a-tool to help.

It took a bit of practice to get consistent results (doesn’t everything?), but I did end up with a satisfying “knot”. To get the “blue” part of the earrings, I decided on adding some pale 2 mm iolites. I would love to try these in a larger gauge of wire, but I think that would really only be possible with fine silver.  Sterling just gets too stiff too fast.

More photos:

Tags: bead, blue, bridal, cold connections, cold joining, constructed, cordierite, dianne karg baron, earring, earrings, etsy, invent-a-tools, iolite, jewellery, jewelry, macrame, photography, silver, sterling silver, wire, wire jewellery, wire jewelry, wirework, wireworking, Year of Jewelry Project

Interview with Your Daily Muse News

Shortly before Christmas I was contacted with an interview request by Tina of Your Daily Muse News.  Tina’s blog is a terrific collection of unusual, inspiring and drop dead gorgeous creations that span a wide range of fine craft.  Her blog immediately became one of my regularly visited bookmarks.

While having a look at the blog earlier today, I discovered that our interview was posted!  You can read it here.

I’m thrilled to be included with the plethora of talent Tina has featured on the site!  Thanks Tina!

Tags: blog, dianne karg baron, fine craft, inspiration, interview, jewellery, jewelry, tutorial, wire, wirework, wireworking, your daily muse news

YOJ10-03 Marquise Series: Pendant 8

Marquise Series:  Pendant 8 (2010)
Sterling silver, fine silver, tourmaline
Constructed, cold-joined, woven
L 5.0 cm x W 2.25 cm x D 1.0 cm

One of my new year’s resolutions was to start using a Job Jar.  My family and friends, who know me very well, know that I’m hopeless about housework.  I think it was Erma Bombeck who said “Nature can’t abhor a vacuum as much as I do.”  That kind of sums up my attitude nicely.

However, I do live with three other (messy) people, so some token effort to maintain order must be made.  So… enter the Job Jar.  I wrote all the various chores on the little slips of paper, and included some fun things, and every day I pick one out of the jar.  The choice is completely random, although I like to think of it as leaving it up to God/the Universe to pick the task that is right for me on any particular day.  Some days I have more energy than others, and interestingly enough, each task so far has been perfect for the day it was chosen.  I do my Job Jar job early in the day, and then the rest of the day is mine to do as I please.

The net result of doing my housework this way is that I’m being much more productive with my jewellery making as well.  So, I feel good because my house is slowly getting cleaner, and I’m getting to work guilt-free on something I love every day.  Bonus!

The studio gremlins paid a me a visit this week and stole this piece for a few hours.  I noticed it was missing after my husband had done a sweep through the house collecting detritus to put out in the garbage on Monday night.  He tends to be somewhat brisk and indiscriminate when he does this.  A frantic search turned up nothing, and I was resigned to it having disappeared into the mass of trash.  On Tuesday, my job from the Jar was “Clean the livingroom.”  It was like a bunch of angels were standing around saying “We want to help you”.  LOL

So, I set to work, cleaning, sweeping and reorganizing the room.  When I picked up and moved one of the toy boxes, lo and behold, there was the pendant!  With a quick prayer of thanks, I put it in a safe location, where I knew I’d find it again.

Like the previous pieces in the series, the pendant is formed using a marquise shape.  When I was first shaped the wire, I thought the pendant looked like a moth.  The form evoked a very strong Art Nouveau influence.  As I added the weaving and the beads, the moth form persisted, and I noticed that the pendant was starting to look like Rainbow Wrapping.

Originally, I was going to hang the pendant the other way around, from the point.  It reminded me of the Star Trek logo.  I didn’t like how the tourmaline drop looked hanging from the long tail though – it threw off the balance.  So the drop was moved to the point, and the tail became the hanging point.

While photographing the piece today, I started seeing the form of an elephant face.   How cool!  I don’t remember ever seeing so many different influences in one piece.

What do you see?  Let me know!

More photos:

Tags: 2010, art nouveau, cold-joined, constructed, dianne karg baron, elephant, fine silver, green, jewellery, marquise, moth, ooak, pendant, rainbow wrap, silver, star trek, sterling silver, tourmaline, wire, wirework, woven, year of jewelry, yoj

YOJ10-01 Marquise Series: Pendant 7

Marquise Series: Pendant 7 (2009)
Sterling silver
Constructed, cold-joined
L 5.2 cm X W 3.3 cm

I made this pendant in the early part of the week, knowing that the first project for the new YOJ was due today.  Up to now, I’ve been working with marquise shapes as single pieces, either as pendants on their own, or linked together in a bracelet.  This one is a compound structure, made from one piece of wire.  It took a bit of torturing to get it to look like this, LOL, but I like how it resembles a whirligig.

Tags: constructed, dianne karg baron, jewellery, jewelry, marquise, pendant, series, silver, sterling silver, wire, wire jewellery, wire jewelry, wirework, wireworking, Year of Jewelry Project

YOJ09-52 Marquise Series: Pendant 6

Marquise Series:  Pendant 6 (2009)
Sterling silver, ribbon
Constructed, cold-joined
L 9.8 cm x W 3.4 cm/Ribbon: L 52 cm x W 3.0 cm

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My ex-husband used to say “Go Big or Stay Home”, so I’m finishing off the Year of Jewelry 2009 with a super-sized version of the Marquise Pendant.  This started off as an experiment to see if the basic marquise shape would translate to a bangle, but I haven’t worked out the kinks to that yet.

I also decided to give the ribbon necklace another try, although again, it’s technically uneconomic to make.  Ah well, I wanted to finish up the year in style!  LOL

Here’s another shot of what it looks like on:

And so this very challenging year comes to an end.  I’ll have a look back over the year and post some thoughts about what I achieved.

Until then, I wish you and those close to you a very Happy New Year, filled with enough challenge to keep you interested, and enough joy to keep you inspired!

All the best in 2010!

Tags: cold connections, cold joining, cold worked, constructed, dianne karg baron, jewellery, jewelry, jewelry making, marquise, pendant, red, ribbon, series, silver, sterling silver, wire, wire jewellery, wire jewelry, wirework, wireworking, Year of Jewelry Project

YOJ09-51 Marquise Series: Pendant 5

Marquise Series:  Pendant 5 (2009)
Sterling silver, fine silver, Swarovski crystal
Constructed, cold-joined, nalbinding
L 6.5 cm x W 1.3 cm

This pendant is made of two “recycled” pieces from Bracelet 3, which didn’t match the other links.  Initially I only added the Swarovskis as embellishment, but the pendant looked unbalanced.  So I decided to add some viking knitting – nalbinding – and create a ribbon-like effect.  The work involved in adding the nalbinding bumps this up from production piece to a “couture” One of a Kind or Limited Edition.

I’m not completely satisfied with how it turned out, but I’m also not able to define what is bothering me about it.   It might just be that it doesn’t work as a pendant.  The design would certainly make a fabulous pair of earrings.  Comments are welcome!

Tags: bead, cold connections, cold joining, constructed, dianne karg baron, fine silver, jewellery, jewelry, marquise, nalbinding, pendant, ribbon, silver, sterling silver, Swarovski, viking knit, viking knitting, wire, wire jewellery, wire jewelry, wirework, Year of Jewelry Project

YOJ09-50 Marquise Series: Bracelet 3

Marquise Series: Bracelet 3 (2009)
Sterling silver, copper, fine silver
Constructed, cold-joined
L 16.8 cm x W 1.1 cm

For this piece, I took the idea developed in Week 48 and extended it to a bracelet.  The design looks simple, yet it surprised me how much work was involved in adding the copper beads.

I like the bi-metal toning – it’s a nice effect, and would really sparkle on tanned, warm toned or dark skin.

Like the project in Week 45, I alternated the links in mirror image; however, the alternating pattern sets up an issue for sizing.  I noticed it with the Week 45 bracelet as well, but because it’s all one metal it’s not as obvious.   With this bracelet, because there are two metals, it becomes clear that there can’t be an odd number of links: it throws off the pattern.  This design will fit either a very small wrist (like this bracelet does), or a very large wrist.  On my wrist, which is a little thinner than standard, but not small, the bracelet fits comfortably with room to move easily, but I generally like to wear my bracelets loose so that they jingle.

The design would look stunning with the Swarovskis I used in Week 48, but adding them will also add to the price of the finished piece.  If you’re interested in a Swarovski version, please email me for a quote.

Tags: bead, bracelet, cold connections, cold joining, cold worked, constructed, copper, dianne karg baron, fine silver, jewellery, jewelry making, marquise, silver, sterling silver, wire, wire jewellery, wire jewelry, wirework, wireworking, Year of Jewelry Project

YOJ09-49 Marquise Series: Pendant 4

Marquise Series:  Pendant 4 (2009)
Sterling silver
Constructed, cold-joined
L 3.6 cm x W 1.6 cm

Here is one more variation in sterling silver.  The original idea was to add a 2 mm Swarovski crystal, similar to what I did in the Week 47 project, but I ended up deciding against it.

Tags: bead, cold connections, cold joining, cold worked, constructed, dianne karg baron, jewellery, jewelry, jewelry making, marquise, pendant, series, silver, sterling silver, wire, wire jewellery, wire jewelry, wirework, wireworking, Year of Jewelry Project

YOJ09-48 Marquise Series: Pendant 3

Marquise Pendant:  Pendant 3 (2009)
Sterling silver, fine silver, Swarovski crystal
Constructed, cold-joined
L3.5 cm x W 1.6 cm

Lots of playing going on!  I love the sparkle of Swarovskis, so I added a thin row of crystals to this next pendant in the series.  I love the classic “sweetheart” look that resulted!

Tags: cold connections, cold joining, cold worked, constructed, dianne karg baron, fine silver, jewellery, jewelry, jewelry making, marquise, pattern, silver, sterling silver, wire, wire jewellery, wire jewelry, wirework, wireworking, Year of Jewelry Project