EotW: Bobbie

The three items featured at my Etsy shop at aileen.etsy.com tend to be colour coordinated and this week's selection is no different. Chosen for their beautiful blue colour are the Wellesley earrings, the Rhiannon necklace, and the Bobbie earrings, which also happens to be the Earrings of the Week. The design has three faceted blue agate beads plus several short lengths of chain. Check out the earrings:

Home renovations

Among the many pieces that will be posted in the next week or so will be a pair of pretty cluster earrings. I have started wiring stones to the cable chain, but had to put the project on hold due to a major home renovation - the gungy grey carpet is being replaced by laminate flooring! I am super excited about the change, but as I have stuff up the wazoo, it is taking a lot of time to clear the rooms so the installers can put in the new floor. Most of the work is done now so I just have to put things back to where they belong and weed out stuff I no longer want, and there really is no better time for this spring cleaning!

Meanwhile, I hope to work on the earrings again soon. There will be some green amethyst and andalusite briolettes plus teeny tiny labradorites and rose quartzes. The work-in-progress name for these earrings is Vanessa, but I won't make my final decision until they are finished.

Red, white, and pink

My box of supplies is a little fuller courtesy of a mini shopping stop on Sunday. I picked up some gorgeous giant crystal quartz briolettes because I might be able to use them in a custom necklace. My dear friend Elisse is getting married in September and I'm making the jewellery for her special day (except for THE piece of course!).

She has asked for something clear and burgundy and cut out photos to show me the necklace styles she likes. We have settled on having it very simple in the front with a single clear briolette, while the back would have three hanging briolettes similar to the way an extender chain dangles. I'm in love with the idea already and just had to find the right stones!

Although I already had some long skinny deep red cubic zirconias (as seen in the Lavinia earrings) and some teeny tiny rhodolite garnet briolettes, I suspected they would not be the right size or shape. My shopping trip did not yield any burgundy stones, but I did find the crystal quartzes, which would look wonderful with my pink mystic quartzes:


I also spotted some solar quartz beads and got one, which I turned into a necklace called Kylie as soon as I got home! Here it is with morganite, vesuvianite, and golden rutile quartz:

Got the blues

This is the bracelet I am working on... It is still in the early stages and I have yet to decide whether to add little dangling stones to the sterling spacers à la the Eugenie bracelet. My favourite part is definitely the giant aquamarine, which has some unexpected rainbow sparkles, but the blue flashes in the rainbow moonstones are pretty too.

New bracelet soon

There are two pieces to report about today: the Drina earrings and a to-be-named bracelet. The Drina is a very simple design with white, peach, and orange courtesy of magnesite and aventurine. These are a pair of what I sometimes call "every day earrings" as opposed to the fancier clustered styles like the Kerenna (snow quartz, champagne diamond, hematite, and rutile quartz):


I began a bracelet two nights ago and am in the process of attaching a gorgeous freeform aquamarine to rainbow moonstones, separated by the same spacers found in the Edwina earrings. Although it is tempting to leave the bracelet that way, I may try to dangle some tiny moss aquamarine and rose quartz beads for a little movement.

Watching Bella

A new pair of earrings was completed while I watched a movie called Bella last night. The Isis uses the same textured hoops as the ones in the Rhonwyn earrings and has a very simple design with rainbow moonstone and snow quartz in graduated sizes. Overall, the earrings appear white, although of course the rainbow moonstones have beautiful blue and yellow-green flashes when light hits them at the right angle. I hope to post the earrings in the shop in the next week or two!

EotW: Joanie

Last week's EotW was Chelsea and this week's special is Joanie. Normally $50, they are $45 until Saturday, March 22nd. The stones are pink topaz, pink tourmaline, citrine, and morganite.

Colours: spring inspiration

I haven't yet had the chance to start the Drina or Isis earrings, but wanted to capture a colour swatch that makes me feel all girly and pretty. I hope to make something from these beads eventually:

When I wasn't photographing icicles at the lodge...

My trip to Vegas was a lot of fun, but now that I am back I have begun working on some new ideas. One piece is already complete and consists of green apatite chips, faceted moss aquamarine, and faceted smoky quartz. These earrings have been named Nicola and also use flat oval findings that I picked up in Hong Kong in the fall.

In the works are two more pairs of earrings: the Drina will have magnesite, sometimes erroneously called white turquoise, plus peach and orange aventurine, while the Isis will pair rainbow moonstone with snow quartz. The idea for these two designs came to me during my trip, specifically when I was at Bright Angel Lodge during my Grand Canyon excursion, so I can't wait to put them together!

New pieces: Paloma, Rita, Dana

Four new pieces were added to aileen.etsy.com yesterday. I've already written about the Carly, but the Paloma is neat too:


Then there is the Rita, a large pair of earrings with wood and cool sterling silver shapes:


Lastly there is the Dana, which was made with the O of two toggles because the bars were too short to be used as a clasp. I initially was going to leave the earrings free of any stones, but before I knew it I had rifled through my beads and found the pairing of smoky quartz and carnelian too pretty to pass up:

EotW: Talisa

The latest earrings of the week are the Talisa. The highlights are the vivid blue apatites that call to mind the clear blue waters of the Caribbean, but the unusual shape of the sterling connectors is not to be missed either. Regularly $25, the EotW price for the Talisa earrings is $22.


Note: Since I will be out of town from Thursday until the early hours of Monday, the next EotW will be announced next Monday instead of Sunday.

Design evolution: Carly

The Carly is finally done and below are some photos to show the design evolution...

When inspiration hit, I was somewhere between Istanbul and Vienna last fall and I did a quick sketch of the design on some Hilton notepaper:


When I decided to turn the sketch into something tangible, I modified the design a little:


And here is the finished piece:


Clearly things don't always turn out the way they looked in my head or on paper, and the Carly was no exception. I ended up going with the original length of chain for the large round beads between the draping, while the small beads connecting the draped chains had to be adjusted for the side drapes to take into account the way the necklace sits on the body. Regardless, I'm pretty happy with how the piece turned out and have to say that it looks much better around a neck than on a flat surface!