Working Through

I find my creativity and mental state are very connected to the weather.  Sunny and I'm on top of the world; gray and rainy--well... gray sucks every bit of creative energy out of me.  Needless to say, it's been raining here for 4 days straight.  I go to work in the studio and everything is a challenge.  Every decision to make is difficult.  I question everything and wonder what am I doing!!!  Where are the days of endless, flowing ideas and designs?! 

They'll return as will the sun.  So in the meantime, I'm just holding on and working through. 

Here's a new necklace with some of my favorite sterling spooly beads.  Handmade from hollow tubing and capped with dapped discs to cup the 20mm beads.  I stamped each tube with a small, repeating circle and added sterling disc dividers to accentuate each ocean jasper's individuality. 

Daisies

So, I've been working all day in the studio and don't have much else to show other than all these daisies.  I am inspired by flowers of all kinds and have found petalled flowers, like daisies, get repeated in my work all the time.  I make them in all sizes, in silver and gold, some with 5 petals others with more and one day I will make a die to punch them out of the metal so I don't have to saw each one out by hand.  But, until then, I will have good days and bad, using one sawblade for a couple months, then running through 5 blades within 3 hours, which was today. 

The cut daisies get filed and sanded and then I mix and match them to create necklaces, earrings, and bracelets. Today my focus was on beads and bead caps.  I took the daisies and dapped them to form an almost half circle and then soldered some of the larger with the smaller to make multi-level pieces.  My intentions are to make a necklace of round semi-precious beads and surround them with the daisies.  They'll cradle the beads and add an interesting line to them.  Hopefully it will work out as well in the final project as it does in my mind.    

Road Trip

Yesterday, I had a trip planned with a jeweler friend, to go to one of my suppliers in Massachusetts to see some of their new inventory and introduce her to their shop.  400 miles, 10 hours, 2 stops at the Beach Pea --YUM!!, 1 traffic jam, and great conversation the whole time, I arrived back home with some new goodies.  Before a trip like this, I make a list of the things I really want to look at, because once I get inside, it's like I'm a kid in a candy store and run from cabinet to cabinet getting more saturated and confused as I go.  One of my favorite things to buy and keep in inventory are South Sea pearls, so this was my first stop.  I found it hard to control myself, and selected 5 strands and then narrowed down my selections to the two strands seen here.  The photo doesn't do them justice, but the top strand is 8-11mm graduated Tahitian pearls that are multi-colored silvers and blacks with lovely overtones.  The bottom strand is 10-12mm and a mix of white and golden yellow pearls with beautiful lustre.  I'll be stringing them up as soon as I can! 

Also keeping in mind some projects that I have going on in the studio, I sought out 4mm gemstones to include in some new ring designs.  These yellow, blue, and apricot sapphires caught my eye and had to come home with me. 

I can't wait to get back in the studio.     

The Beginning

This is the beginning of what I hope will be an entertaining and informative view of the goings on in my studio while I create my one-of-a-kind jewelry.  I'll show you new pieces as they start right through to the completed piece, as well as talk about different stones and techniques that I use. 

A little information about myself: 
I am formally trained as a sculptor with a degree from Boston University.  I moved from Mass to Maine full-time in the summer of 1995.  Always interested in making jewelry, I first started in 1996 with an introduction class at Maine College of Art and the rest is history.  My interest is in creating original designs in silver and gold, using precious and semi-precious stones and beads, while working in series and not interested in mass production.  I appreciate seeing the hand that makes the jewelry. 

I'm not really sure about this whole blog thing, but...here goes.