Bright sun brings urge for bright colours

I´ve been creating tiny intricate stuff for some time now. But the bright sun, inspired me to make some plain colourful pieces for my Suzy Q Trinkets shop.

Normally I don´t like to just string my jewelry. Bores the /&%¤ out of me. But these I actually enjoyed making.

Sometimes I get an image in my head and can´t get rid of it until I create what I see. And it was just like that with this simple design.

I saw a plain row of smooth beads only interrupted by one single silver bead.

Eventually I had made 5 desings out of that idea. All different, but with the single "interruption" in common.

I´m lucky to have two shops, one with intricate designs with only precious materials and one with more simple designs, sometimes made of vintage plastic beads.

See more pictures in my shop: www.suzyqtrinkets.etsy.com

Emerald Isle necklace

This months Team Wire Artisans Guild challenge "Emerald Isle" and my longing for spring really came together in this necklace. The image I got in my head when thinking of "Emerald Isle" was green meadows full of spring flowers.

I tried to work on a celtic inspired idea, but the meadow image kept popping up in my head. So here it is...

The original idea was to make a pearl chain. I have a strand of really beautiful spring green freshwater pearls. But somehow I felt this flat diamond cable chain suited the necklace better. Perhaps I will let the customer choose.

Material:
925 sterling silver and 999 fine silver chain, wire and findings. Peridot briolettes and a round smooth citrin bead. Oxidized and tumbled
Size: Chain measures 16". Pendant 1"x1.2"/2,5x3cm

See more pictures at www.suzyqjewelry.etsy.com

How to name your company or brand

Lately I´ve been reading a lot about how to name companies and brands.

I´m thinking about opening a jewelry store in Sweden and need a great name. I´ve browsed the web and found a bunch of things to consider when picking a name.

Here are some of the ideas I´ve found useful.

• Get an “umbrella” name. If you are going to sell jewelry, don´t have a name with jewelry in it. What if you want to start selling scarves too? (That means my current name sucks :)) The name should still work if you want to expand.


• Search the web to see if the company name is free as a domain address.


• The name doesn´t have to have a meaning. You can always fill it with meaning with an underline, that you can drop when your name is established. That means nonsense names are OK.


• Short names, and names with hard sounds are remembered more easily. Google, Kodak, Plurk are great examples.


• Make sure your company name is easy to spell.


• Brainstorm to find your name. Start with what you want your name to be associated with. Mix letters and give the words new endings like –ax, -ex, -or, -er, -ac, -oc.
  

Still can´t find a name? Try Breadline Design Naming Machine! :)

Dreaming of summer meadows

I´ve added a new necklace to my Etsy shop. This necklace really is an expression of my dreams of summer and spring.

Last night it fell another 4" of snow so the winter keeps holding a tight grip of Sweden. My kids love it though. The snow castles they´ve built in the garden are amazing. But yet, my cat and I agree upon one thing - it´s enough now. Let the spring arrive!

Well, back to the necklace, I´ve tried to wove all that longing for warmer days into this pendant.

It´s a medallion like pendant with a beautiful butterfly, surrounded by a swirly pattern set with spring colours. The pendant is very light weighted though it gives a dense expression. It looks gorgeous togheter with anything purple. And I guess a plain white shirt will go nice with it too.

I had many thoughts of adding more tiny pearls and beads to the chain, but I decided to keep it plain, not to loose the medallion feeling.

Do you agree with me on that decision?

Material:925 sterling silver, oxidized and tumbled to a nice shine. 925 sterling silver butterfly charm from Bali. Pink amethyst, peridot and white freshwater pearls.

Size:Pendant 1.2"/3cm, 1.6"/4cm including the bail. Chain is 16"/40cm

Lady Una - bangle

This is a bangle made for The Wire Artisans Guild challenge Stardust and our great re-opening of our Etsy team store on Valentines day.

The movie Stardust begins and ends with the beautiful Lady Una living in the magical world of Fairie. Lady Una is kept as a slave for Madame Semele. She gives birth to the main character, Tristan, but has to leave him to his father who lives in "the real world". Lady Una is very much a charachter in the background, but the end of the movie reveals her well kept secret.

The colours of Lady Unas teal dress and the yellow/red carriage of Madame Semele (Ditchwater Sal) inspired me to make this bangle.
I loved the movie. It was so full of both beautiful scenes and humour and of course all the elements to make it a wonderful feel good story. Don´t miss Robert de Niro playing the tough captain with a little secret hidden in the closet....

The bangle and focal, together form a clasp. One of the images show to open and close the bangle. The trick is to angle the focal. I managed to do it myself with one hand...But you can always ask someone else to help you with this...

Material:925 sterling silver and 999 fine silver wire and findings. Alex topaz briolettes (heat treated), ruby leaves and rondelles, citrine briolette and smooth rondelles and white cultured white fresh water pearls. Oxidized and tumbled to a nice shine.
Size:The bangle fits an arm between 6"-7"/15-17cm. It moves around a bit on a smaller arm.

Be sure to visit the grand re-opening of The Wire Artisan Guild Etsy team store on Valentines day: http://www.wireartisansguild.etsy.com/

Source of my style PART II

I recently wrote about my great grandmothers necklace as a source for my love of intricate designs. But something of equal importance to the origin of my style, as the necklace, is my period as a guard and guide at the Royal Palace in Stockholm. This was something I did while studying for a masters degree in Art.

The palace in Stockholm was built in the 18th century and is fully furnished with a lot of treasures from that time. Everything from the decorations in the ceilings to details on doors is so delicate. I also worked at the Royal Armoury where all armours and clothes from past monarchs are kept. The museum displays the most beautiful gold-embroidered wedding clothes and coronation pieces. They even have a stuffed horse, Streiff, which belonged to the king Gustav II Adolf who was murdered at the battle in Lützen 1632!

One exhibition at the Royal Armoury have etched itself into my memory more than any other. It was the exhibit of jewelry from the court jeweller WA Bohlin, a colleague to the more famous Fabergé in Russia. WA Bohlin choose to escape Russia to Stockholm when the revolution started 1917. In Stockholm the firm soon became court jeweller and are so still today.

The jewelry exhibition showed masterpieces dated back to the 19th century. As a guard I had plenty of time to enjoy and study all the jewelry. I was totally enchanted buy the precious gems, shapes and the intricacy of the designs. I still have the exhibition catalogue and now as a jewelry designer myself (playing in a totally different league though) I look at all the beauty even more impressed.
If you ever visit Stockholm you must see the Royal Palace and the Armoury!

Dresses I would love to make jewelry for

My favorite type of custom orders are when a customer wants something made for a special gown or dress. Nothing triggers my creative engine like that kind of request. I love to come up with designs that fits how the dress is cut, the textures and the colours. Just like I did for sweet Erin who had the most beautiful vintage 50´s gown for her wedding.

Erins dress is all cream coloured and wrapped up in lace and finished with a chocolate brown ribbon. I´m very happy with the earrings I made for this dress. It´s a swirly designs that captures the expression of the lace and the texture of the fabric. And the smokey quartz, brown and cream coloured freshwater pearls I put on the earrings match the colour of the dress nicely. Do I have to say the photos from Erins wedding was like a dream! She was so beautiful!
Here are some dresses I would love to make jewelry to go with. First is a dress by Anna Sui with (again) a beautiful lace pattern. I think I would choose tiny spinel rondelles for this one contrasted with one single bright coloured stone. Earring would be best for this dress. With a dramatic design.

Anna Sui also designed this psychedelic paisley patterned dress with vibrant colours. For this one I would love to make a cuff with fuchsia and tangerine colours sprinkled with details in 14k gold filled.

Finally I would feel blessed if I could make something for this 1940´s vintage dress. Or actually it feels like I´ve already made it! Don´t you think the FIRST LOVE necklace would look lovely with this dress? If you feel really romantic?

Vintage Textile sells this beautiful dress.

FIRST LOVE - romantic necklace

This necklace is made for the monthly Wire Artisans challenge, and the theme for the month is Affair Of The Hearts. My jewelry are normally very romantic, but this time I went all the way and made a VERY romantic piece. It´s all about that wonderful first love we experience where the world are seen through pink glasses and will never be the same. It´s like someone found a key to our most inner chambers.

Originally, as you see on the sketch, I had the idea that I would tie a velvet bow onto the bail. I tried but never managed to tie a nice bow. Think I got to find ready made tiny bows for next project.

You can also see from the sketch that I´ve changed some details. The scrolls are a bit different. These are things that I´m aware of will change when I sketch. It´s hard to grasp how large the finished piece will be – and how many and big details will fit.

What I managed to achieve is a necklace with a “locket feeling”. Almost like a heirloom piece. The oxidized greyness adds patina and looks great with the pink tones. I´m also very pleased with the twisted wire I´ve made by myself. It wasn´t as hard as I thought at first.. JMaterial:925 sterling silver and 985 Karen hill tribe silver details. Natural pink cultured freshwater pearls, pink tourmalines, rhodolite garnet and tiny peridot beads.Size:Pendant 2"/5cm, chain 16"/40cm

You can see more pictures in my shop: http://www.suzyqjewelry.etsy.com/

I´ve also started to take pics in a new way. With details of nice fashion adds as background I´m trying to add the feeling I think suits the piece. Not quite sure yet what I think of the result. So I´m trying not to use these pics to much.

What do you think?

Fabric + jewelry = TRUE LOVE!

Right now I´ve got a thing for jewelry with textiles, lace and embroidery-like solutions. And suddenly I see it everywhere. A trend perhaps?

I´ve tried to figure out what it is that I like about the usage of fabric in jewelry. And it must be the textures and the contrast between hard and soft, if the jewelry also are made of metal. Fabric and metal makes a great clash between cold and warm. Since I´m a swirly girl, the usage of scrolls, vines and flower embellishments could also play a part…

My favourite jewelry designers using fabric are Tinctory ( http://www.tinctory.etsy.com/) and Edera Jewelry (http://www.ederajewelry.etsy.com/).

Tinctory stands for a more strict, modern look. I just love her choice of colours – always great against the base which is oxidized silver. Edera jewelry are more like traditional brocade, full of intricate patterns. I always dream of wearing her jewelry with Versailles or some other “little house” as a fond…

Two designers that recently started to experiment with fabric in their jewelry are Eclettica, (http://www.eclettica.etsy.com/ )and Meristem (http://www.meristem.etsy.com/) .

Both Eclettica and Meristem are gurus for me when it comes to colour – and now they impress me with their courage to experiment with fabric too. Check out their latest pieces and enjoy the fantastic work - fabric included or not.

So will fabric reach my jewelry? I might tie a descrete ribbon bow on a pendant soon. But that´s as far as I will dare to go I think…:)

The source of my style

If it´s possible at all to point out a certain object to be the source of my style it has to be this necklace. My great grandmother, Fanny, a lady with Sami origin (natives living in the north of Sweden) got this as a gift 1947.

It´s a 925 sterling silver pendant with a rococo lady and beautiful ornaments. I´ve always adored this piece. The design contains everything I want to achive with my own jewelry; interesting swirly details, a feminine expression and a wonderful balanced composition (even though it´s assymetrical).

Ever since I got this necklace in my hands I´ve loved it. And when I found it again today and polished it - it all seemed so clear to me. This necklace must be the explanation for my love for swirly jewelry. Of course being brought up in the 70´s with stripes, large flower patterns and pine wood furniture can also be reason to my preferance for inricate, swirly and shiny materials :).

Being a Swede I´m supposed to embrace the nordic "blond" minimalistic designs so common here. I think no other people has taken "less is more" as serious as the Swedes. :)

I don´t have any daughters of my own, but will hopefully have grand daughters to pass this on to. And I´m sure they will treasure it like I do – even if fashion changes all the time and it will only lie in their jewelry boxes.

Do YOU have a particular object that can be the source of your taste and style? I´d love if you shared the story here. It doesn´t have to be about something that inspires you to make jewelry - it can be anything.

RETURN OF INNOCENSE - new necklace

This is a piece I started sketching on as my contribution to The Wire Artisans Guild challenge ART NOUVEAU. But somewhere along the way it travelled in time and ended up more as an EDWARDIAN piece. But the two styles where very close to each other in time.

The Edwardian era are sometimes referred to as the “belle époque”. Swirly intricate designs where common and platinum and pearls where highly preciated.




Read more about the Edwardian era and the jewelry of that tim at “Antique jewelry at Topazery”.
Even if this necklace doesn´t fit as an entry for the challenge, I like it a lot. So swirly, and intricate.

With this piece I wanted to give more density to the style I usually have, and I really think I managed to achive it. Even though it took me more steps than usual.




As you can see on the pic showing the sketch and the finished result I made some changes while creating as usual. And at first I left the piece shiny but decided to oxidize to enhance the detail.

This piece is so feminine, in a way women strived to achive in the past millenium, so what name could be better than the titel of the old ENIGMA song RETURN OF THE INNOCENSE.





Material: A lot of sterling silver went into this piece! 925 sterling silver wire and findings. Hundreds of tiny 1mm 985 silver Karen Hill tribe beads. Cultured white fresh water pearls.Oxidized to enhance the details.

Size:Chain 11", pendant 3" including bail, 2.5" without bail and ring.

Learn to mix and match colours

Even if I´ve been making jewelry since 2004, I still have a hard time to combine colours. Most of the time I end up with using only hues of one colour. And I so admire jewelry artists that are good at combining three or more colours like Sky Dreams or Elle a Belle. But I work hard to get by this and I think I´ve become better in the past year.

I use some tricks that I want to share to you poor designers that are in my situation...I know most of you are not. So I guess this post will not help many, since most people seem to manage this fundamental skill !

The first thing you should start with if you want to approve how you handle colour, is to read some about colour theory. You may recognize some words from this in the back of your head, you probably heard them in school; primary colour, complementary colour and so on. This kind of theoretical information is great to know, but are not very inspirational.

Today there are many tools available at the Internet to help you mix and match colours. Mainly they are developed by web designers, but they can be handy for more people depending on colour. For example, try the “colour wheel machine” you can find at Colours on the web. There you can spin the wheel virtually and get examples of colour combinations you can use in your jewelry. The tricky part can be to find stones that match the example. If you want to use what the pro´s use you can download Color Wheel Pro where you can get more variations. Eni Oken, well known jewelry designer, has a colour match program for free download too.

But finding combinations you like are actually easier than that. Just look at nature, on butterflies, flowers and birds. Nature never chooses wrong and you can find amazing colour schemes that you can transform to your jewelry. Or why not take that pile of glossy magazines saving dust on your coffee table and use it for this purpose. Pictures of interiors or fashion photos give you an endless combination of colours.

All the examples so far are great, but my favourite way to find combinations is from fabrics with patterns. I just choose one I like and try to dissect which colors they´ve used, and I often end up with 5 colours or more. I also note which one is the dominant to achive the same balance.
So far I´ve never had that many matching stones at home, but I have managed to use this method to come up with a combination of three colours. And that is much for me!!!!
Make 2009 your colour breakthrough!

Sleeping Beauty - fairy tale necklace

Here it is - the Sleeping Beauty necklace I blogged about earlier. Now it´s finally been put together. It looks almost like my sketch, I only did a few changes and added the draped chain on both sides. The design needed more balance.

I got the inspiration from an illustration of Sleeping Beauty by William A. Breakspeare. So beautiful and with an oriental touch. You´ll find the illustration here.

Material:925 sterling silver, 985 and 999 fine silver wire and findings. Pink and purple amethyst, vesuvianite rondelles and white fresh water pearls.Size:16"/40cm. Focal with chains and briolettes 4"/10cm.

What I don´t like about making necklaces is that I haven´t found a great way to take pics of them. Got to buy me some kind of model and experiment more with angles.

See more pictures of this necklace in my Etsy shop.

Large jewelry rules spring 2009

We heard it already last year - large, statement jewelry is the thing. And this will continue through spring and summer 2009 according to Fashionising.com . That sounds great to me since wire jewelry almost always tend to becom large.

Jewellery in the 2009 collections from the cat walks, took many and various forms. There were a few common threads amoung them, however, including:

• Geometric shapes
  


• Exotic and ethnic inspirations
  


• Rich colours; prominent stones and gems

See more pictures and read the whole article at Fashionising.com

Red carpet jewelry

Looking for inspiration for new fabulous designs? Why not have a look at what all the celebrities where wearing for their red carpet moments previous years.

http://www.diamond-legend.info/people/redcarpet.html



I love to google around the web for fantastic outfits and jewelry. It makes my creative mind go off instantly. So whenever my mind is empty when sitting at the working bench I just go to the computer and look for images and wait for that color, detail or story that will give me ideas.

As told in previous posts FAIRY TALES is my source of inspiration for spring 2009. For this I´ve found a wonderful site with a lot of original stories and the history behind them. Got my head full of ideas. Now I just need time :)