Shapinsay again

These earrings are the second incarnation of Shapinsay, after the first pair was sold to Ania from Shapinsay (yes, from there!). I think I'll make a collection of earrings under this name inspired by the island colours :) Here I surrounded a juicy green Peridot (the colour of the grass) with yellow Jasper and orange Carnelian - like the little wild flowers on a meadow. Then I and added a purple Amethyst and burgundy Garnets - colours of the Sea Pink and  wild orchids.

 

Summer SALE

I decided to mark down some of my old designs and have a sale :) It starts with these earrings that are now only £30 - just follow the link below the photos.

Green Feathers earrings

Rose Fuchsias earrings

Calla Lily - the hand weaved flower

This was the craziest project I've done so far - it took 11 hours of work and meters and meters of the thinnest Fine Silver wire. This pendant is an incarnation of my love to flowers and was created with a company of a little Calla Lily plant sitting on my work table. The wire was weaved on a hand shaped sterling silver frame to form light and airy petal embracing softly its heart - the amazing sparkling Lemon Quartz briolette.

Still refreshing

The next necklace I was working with is the Tiger Eye. I also oxidised it black and then just delicately hand buffed to keep the patina. This way it looks much more romantic and elegant. Also this beeing a small pendant it is now much better visible when worn directly on the skin.

The new pendant is on the right photo.

The process

I wrote about my designing and creating process looks like: that sometimes I let my fingers play with wire to  follow the flow of a certain stone and other times I put my design on paper first. Since that post I had people asking me for photos of the sketched designs so today I present you my latest work, this afternoon drawing. From the top there are: Kyanite, Turquoise and natural Lemon Jaspe. All three of them are pretty big stones, with the Turquoise being the largest: almost 6cm long. The first two are cabochons, they have no holes drilled and need carefull thought how to set them securely with wire only. That is why I need to put my idea on the paper first, it's almost ingeneering work. Also, I don't want to waste any milimeter of the Silver (considering its high price recently!) so before I begin playing with wire I will measure what I need and cut the desired lengths. After that it's only fun: hours of wire wrapping, oxydising, polishing and buffing - all in my quiet attic studio :)

Back from holiday

I just came back from short holidays and realised I hadn't written here for long time! So, to make up for all that peace and quiet, I present you my newest ring, fresh from the workshop, just finished. A big, organic coctail ring, something for a confident woman :)

Thunder In a Jar of Honey with rough natural Amber nugget and two Blue Sapphires. All metal is Sterling Silver. It will be listed soon.

I have some more pieces I haven't mentioned them here yet and I will write about them soon. I promiss!

Sunshine!

It's this time of year again when I find myself working with Amber. I guess it's the long wait for Spring and longer sunny days that makes me choose those warm, vibrant, juicy and almost sweet yellows and oranges. You can almost feel the tase of honey when you look at Amber, or think of a sunny beach, holidays, lazyness and relax My newest projects: The Bond necklace and Dragon's Eye ring. And there is more to come!

New Year's changes and SALES!

This year I want to spend as much of my time with my baby son as possible and I just realised that having to manage THREE online jewellery outlets is way too time consuming! It's because I need to edit the photos into three different sizes, write descriptions, then convert prices from Pound Sterling to US Dollars, convert measurements from metric to that imperial one... and then it's the uploading all of that to three websites... My New Year's resolution then is to minimise the time I have to spend with computer and to concentrate on my own website only. That is why for some unspecified time I'm closing my Artfire and Etsy shops.

But before I will do so I will have a BIG SALE in each one of them :) The first one to go is the Artfire Studio with 30% OFF on all jewellery. It's till the end of January only. Happy shopping and Happy New Year!

Special Promotion!

I decided to have a special sale for my Facebook Fans :) If you'd like to know more and if you'd like to get 20% discount on any of my jewellery pieces go to http://www.facebook.com/blue.almonds and "Like" the page :) Offer ends on 1st December 2010!

Waiting for Godot

Some month ago we were impatiently waiting for our first baby to be born. We didn't know whether it was a boy or a girl, it was to ba a surprise. The due date had came... and it passed... and still nothing happened! To kill the time I sat one day in my studio and started creating a new necklace for myself. My hands would choose only delicate hues: soft pinks and roses, pearls and yellows and we started laughing that it must be a girl we were expecting and that it was her telling me the colours. Then a week later and... we welcomed our baby son! Well, one day I'll give him a very special necklace with a story to tell his fiancé ;)

Grand opening!

My beautiful re-vamped website www.blue-almonds.eu is now officially open and working :) It not only has new smarter design but most important: it has a cart so you can buy more than one item at a time! Tempting :)

Little gift

A little gift for a friend: large Rhyolite flat drop adorned only with simple Art Nouveau style design and one tiny Freshwater Pearl. Heavily oxidised and delicately polished to keep the black and shiny patina.

The Beginning

Spring - the time of new life. The beginning.

The second ring in the Spring theme features beautiful sparkling chocolate brown Smoke Quartz accompanied by microfaceted rounds: deep cognac Tourmalines, soft pale green Prehnite, moss green Vesuvian and delicate Moonstone with flashes of blue. All the colours of awaking Nature.

And I think I'm beginning to like work with cabochons - those stones with no hole drilled, the very tricky ones to set when you're working with wire only... but hey, what a joy when a cab finally gets in place you wanted it to be :D

Glass From Space

I made this pendant for my Mom. She chose the stone - Moldavite - accodring to Wkipedia: a substance possibly formed by a meteorite impact. A glass from the Space! Bottle green, strangely shaped it looks like very unusual glass. Or like a jelly baby ;) The shape of Mom's stone was so wavy and uncomfortable to work with I not only sketched the design but even made a detailed drawing!I made this pendant in the Art Nouveau style, in a butterfly shape, and decorated with very fine Black Spinel and Peridote briolettes. All metal is Sterling Silver, oxidised and then hand polished.

Nephele and clouds

This ring used all my patience... it's all gone for some time. It was used during the process of creating this newest ring. The citrine cabochon is oval and very tall, and its all surface is hand cut beautifully. In one word - a masterpiece . I wanted to show off not only the flat top surface but also the stone sides and I had a certain idea in my mind. It took however about 4 weeks and one ring (I created Anna Karenina when I couldn't set the Citrin in the first time) to finally achieve my dream. I started weaving for the second time and I decided this time I'd make it! The construction was slightly different than my other rings - this time I made the band and the stone setting as two separate parts joined together half way through. This design allows seeing the stone sides and makes the ring look very delicate and airy when also being a safe and sturdy enclosure for the cabochon. I added three Freshwater pearls and oxidised the ring a little. Then for about two hours I was polishing and buffing, polishing and buffing... The result is almost white, fresh silver but with intriguing depth, almost like the patina which old jewellery can have.
I named the ring Nephele which is a name of a Greek nimph of cloud and mist. Why? This is the view that inspired me this morning:

Joy of the Season

Last year I made three or four rings in a certain style and I called them Rings Of Joy for I was very happy creating them. Picking the different little stones of all the vibrant colours, matching them in sets, then playing with the wire wrapping bands - I enjoyed every single moment of the process. I think it was the joy of Christmas one can start experiencing in December that made my Muse to follow that design again. The first one came up in - surprise, surprise! - in a green and burgundy combination.The second one - sweet like the icing on English Christmas cake. The third one - blue and golden like the blue and clear sky I enjoyed today when I went for a walk in the fields. I don't have names for them yet...

Why Water, why Fire?

I 'm not sure why I keep creating jewellery in those colour schemes... maybe it's the waters that surround me here, the rains and mists and the view from my studio towards Cromarty Firth... that could have been the inspiration to create the Deep Water earrings with Water Sapphires (Iolite) and Lapis Lazuli. My latest dream about winter evenings spent near fire and watching the flames in silence must have lead my eyes and hands to pick the warm saffron orange of Carnelian and the joyful fanta-orange of Hessonite Garnet to create Fire Earrings. This dream is not just a wish though - we are having a wood burning stove installed in our house before Christmas! I can't wait for it!

The round focals are crocheted with Sterling Silver wire and wire wrapped. Both pairs are in the Special Free Worldwide shipping offer till 10 December.

Special offer in my shops!

I decided to have SPECIAL OFFERS in my shops between 26 November and 10 December:

In my Artfire shop you get FREE RECORDED AND INSURED DELIVERY to all countries for all my jewellery pieces. And that's not everything: I also decided to have a 10% SALE in Polish Gold and Pure Luxury Collections :)

For my Etsy users I'm offering FREE RECORDED AND INSURED DELIVERY to all countries for all my jewellery pieces.

Happy shopping and happy Thanksgiving to all who celebrate it!!!

The Elements - finished

The first five necklaces from the new Elements collection are finished. Each one is crocheted and wrapped with Sterling Silver.

EARTH. The gems are: Bronzite square, Unakite plumpy drop, Malachite, green Aventurine, Peridot.
DARK WATERS. The gems are: deep cobalt blue Kyanite oval in the centre. It's accompanied by a cluster of lovely smooth natural Blue Sapphires and creamy Freshwater Pearls.

HOT AIR. The gems are: natural Yellow Agate coin, natural Lemon Jasper flat smooth drop, Yellow Serpentine smooth round, Citrine faceted rounds.

FIRE. The gems are: Red Tiger's Eye oval, Red Coral, Sunstone (synthetic), Carnelian.

SPRING WATER. The gems are: Apatite faceted onion, Turquoise nugget, Pale Green Jade, Aquamarine, Freshwater Pearls.

Something new

I've just started working on a new line for a local Inverness shop - Araveli in Victorian Market for those who know the area. The colour themes are inspired by the Nature elements: the blue of Water, the reds of Fire, the whites, crystals and pale yellow of Air and greens, bronzes of Earth. Most of the designs will be made in a technique I've been using since I was a little girl - crocheting. Here is the first jewel I'm creating, Hot Air colours:
Yellow Agate, Lemon Jasper, Serpentine, Citrine and Sterling Silver.