Personalised Bracelets

I must have far too much time on my hands because I have been investigating recently if there are any patterns to the types of custom made jewellery that I am asked to make for people. It is always good to be prepared so I looked into if certain months of the year are dominated by a particular style of jewellery. There are certainly jewellery buying trends that are driven by events in the year such as Christmas and Mothers Day, but then there are other buying patterns of my jewellery I can’t really explain.

For example September is repeatedly the month where personalised bracelets dominate. I can’t explain why and it is not related to a particular style of bracelet but this generally repeats itself year after year. So the following are a few examples of the personalised bracelets that I made for people last month...

Personalised Name on Rice Bracelet

I have been making Name on Rice Jewellery for a while now however have always made pendants, so this is my first bracelet containing rice writing. Originally the ‘Dad’ asked me to make three individual pendants, with each of their children’s names written onto grains of rice. Subconsciously I probably knew it was ‘personalised bracelet month’, because I suggested attaching the charms to a bracelet which would at least give the option of having individual pendants at a later date.

Personalised Name on Rice Bracelet

Lock of Hair Keepsake Bracelet

I was initially asked to encapsulate a lock of hair within one of my sterling silver pendants and to engrave the back of the pendant with a message. However the message became a poem and not something that was going to fit onto the back of a pendant, so again it was suggested to incorporate the hair into a bracelet instead. (Are you seeing a pattern here? I am now beginning to think that it is me that is influencing the seasonal buying trends of my jewellery!).

Hair Keepsake Bracelet

Horse Hair Bracelet

I am now just satisfying my initial statement that there are seasonal variations in the type of jewellery that people buy, and indeed September is the month for personalised bracelets. Now I am confident that I didn’t influence the decision to have this horse hair set within a bracelet, it was asked for I promise! I did suggest having the glitter within each charm though (but then if it was me I would have glitter in everything!).

Horse Hair Bracelet

I began writing this blog post convinced that there were patterns to the type of jewellery that people buy throughout the year. As the blog post has gone on I have become less and less convinced... is it just me that has been influencing these decisions?

Mick

Handmade Poppies for the Poppy Appeal 2012

No I haven’t taken up knitting just yet, although I wish I could as it would save a fortune on buying clothes! This hand knitted poppy arrived in the post last week and it is lovely, it is also lovely to know that all of the money paid for it (they are on sale for a suggested donation of £5) goes to the Poppy appeal 2012.

Hand Knitted Poppy - Poppy Appeal 2012

Laura of Tiny Stitches and her team are knitting poppy brooches in support of the Royal British Legion and the work that they do for the armed forces. Laura is aiming to make as many Poppies as possible so is also looking for knitters who can help her too.

Tiny Stitches Poppy Appeal 2012

If you haven’t got your Poppy yet they can be purchased from her Etsy shop and please help spread the word if you can. Her poppies really are lovely; they are handmade and help such a great cause.

Mick

How to preserve wedding flowers

A couple of weeks ago I took delivery of a huge box of pressed flowers that the lady had pressed following her recent wedding. The box included flowers from her wedding bouquet as well as a sample of her lace wedding dress material. She wanted both the flowers and wedding dress material preserved within necklaces for her and her bridesmaids as keepsakes of their special day.

Over the next couple of days I began to sort through the flowers and prepared various designs for her pendants. I had so much choice because of the beautiful selection of flowers that my design document grew at such a rate and I produced a 14 page design document, all annotated with the different possibilities. There was so much choice!

Wedding flower jewellery design

We settled on a couple of designs however first I needed to check the feasibility of embedding the fabric within the resin. I have made several pendants in the past incorporating wedding dress material but nothing as delicate as this lace material. So I made a test pendant incorporating the material and here it is.

Wedding dress lace pendant

The pendant was given as a freebie to the lady and we agreed that the fabric would look good as a backing to the flowers within the pendants. So over the next few I started to incorporate the wedding flowers within the pendants and here is an example.

Wedding flowers and dress pendant

And this pendant was given to one of the bridesmaids.

Wedding flower keepsake jewellery

They were all given a little bit of Shpangle by incorporating some glitter dust; I do like my glitter dust and would add it to everything if I could!

Mick