Things in Bronze

Since my sulk-sabbatical, I seem to have recovered my passion for making jewellery. I've gone mad for wraparound bracelets lately but I haven't taken any pictures of those so I'll post about the things I made with bronze findings instead.

Last weekend I sat down with a pile of my bronze bits and pieces and decided to make an effort to use some of them. As well as the usual findings there were also bronze charms, pendants, and bronze-coloured acrylic beads.

The first thing I made was a matching necklace and earring set, with a simple design of an acrylic heart and some red beads. It occured to me while I was making them that I'm lucky I didn't rediscover my problem with metals while I was wearing earrings. That could have been unpleasant.

Then I sat down with a big pile of beads I'd planned to make myself a bracelet with, and made a longline necklace buy stinging selections onto eyepins and linking them with short lengths of figaro chain.

Then I made a pair of matching earrings, as I like to make sets.

Apologies for thequality of that last picture. Blogger wouldn't upload it, so I've linked directly from Etsy.

lThere are still loads of bronze things left to use, and plenty of brass too. Lots to do in future!

Copper and Bronze and Brass, Oh My.

It's been a couple of months since I posted, and I have to admit it's because I've been sulking.

See, back in my early teens my brother gave me a rather fetching copper ring with a kind of ivy pattern engraved around it. I loved it, but unfortunately the thick green band it left on my finger was also how I discovered I don't react well to copper. Over the years I've avoided copper jewellery, even though I love the colour. I don't even think about it any more.

I don't think about it to the extent that I spent six months enthusiastically buying cute charms and chain in bronze and brass. 'Cos they'd be fine, y'know?

Um, no.

This is a piece I affectionately named The Clockwork Owl's Nesting Place, although I'm not sure if owls actually nest. It's one of the first watch plate pendants I made. The owl and the leaf are antique bronze, with a matching chain.

After wearing it for about a week solid, I started getting really itchy around the back of my neck. When I took the necklace off I noticed that around the clasp the chain had gone a lovely copper colour. So I looked in the mirror and saw an attractive green streak along the back of my neck. And then I remembered that bronze and brass are alloys of copper.

And that's when I had a sulk. I'd got all those charms and things with plans to make myself some new jewellery. The Etsy shop was really only an excuse to make more of the stuff than I could ever actually wear, but now it's going to be an outlet for all the creations I want to wear but can't. Some of my designs I'm trying to rework in silver, but a lot of what I've got will have to go.

Expect to see a lot of bronze and brass in my shop in the near future, and lots of posts where I try to figure out alternatives to chain and metal charms.

Steampunk fossil necklace

One of the things that made me decide to make my own jewellery was when I found this bead on Etsy.

 

It came from a shop called Impossible Fossils, which specialises in steampunk resin beads. I had this one for ages before I had the vaguest idea what to do with it. In the end I decided to use it as the focal bead for a steampunk necklace.

The problem was that it wouldn't fit on a jump ring, and I didn't have any wire, so I used an antique bronze headpin and made a loop at the top. I hung a white glass pearl from the top to embellish the plain wire. On either side of the focal bead I hung charms made from silver and amber beads, pearls, and watch parts to create my first steampunk charm necklace.

Introduction

Back in November, I stumbled into making jewellery.

Stumbled is the right word, really. I was browsing Etsy, looking for a Steampunk necklace. I bought one I liked, then somehow ended up buying some charms and findings as well. Before I knew it I'd added to the collection: beads, more charms, charity shop finds to dismantle. A couple of magazines later and I was making my own necklaces, bracelets and earrings.

This wasn't one of my first projects, but it's the one that means most to me so far. When I was eight or so I had a leaf charm bracelet. It jangled with metal and plastic charms in dark colours, bronze and purple. I loved it, but it was quite conspicuous and I was not a confident child. I stopped wearing it, and because I wasn't wearing it eventually got rid of it.

I've really regretted it, and taking up making my own jewellery seemed to be the perfect cue to replicate at least the feel of that long-gone bracelet. I bought some glass leaf charms...

... and some antiqued bronze charms from Etsy, and along with some charms taken from charity-shop necklaces I made this.

The chain is a shortened charity shop find in an antique colour. It's not the same as the bracelet I used to have, but it jangles pleasantly and I really like wearing it. It's a little heavy on the bronze charms at the moment, but I aim to replace sme of them as I come across other leaf charms I like. On the whole I'm very pleased with it though.