Showing posts with label the bleeding heart. Show all posts
Showing posts with label the bleeding heart. Show all posts

Wednesday, January 27, 2010

A Drop of Sunshine....



Lately, I'm into very long necklaces with just a crystal or a few charms. When I went to NYC at Thanksgiving, I made sure I hit as many bead shops as possible. That's where I found a set of deep red faceted crystal drops. I love red, it's my favorite color, so I had to buy them.

Color symbolism varies from culture to culture. Popular U.S. culture probably would interpret red to represent blood. the bleeding heart would be a perfect place for a vampire inspired necklace.

But if we're talking about me, Cindy and not when I'm in a bad mood or feeling insecure, I'd prefer to interpret red as representing the sun. When I wear this around my neck it means I'm wearing a drop of sunshine.

Thursday, December 03, 2009

Inspiration: Grandma's Necklace and Artbeads' Cubic Zirconia


Going through my Grandmother's jewelry many years ago and trying to decide what I wanted to keep, I selected a classic design made with cable chain and crystals. I blogged about her necklace before focusing on the staple setting for each crystal.

It's a simple necklace, cable chain, spring clasp and crystals. Looks to me as if the chain and settings for the crystals were plated or maybe gilded but I can't tell for sure. It's very small too, 14 and 1/2 inches, made for a very young woman I assume. My maternal grandmother was married at age 14 and I imagine she could have worn a small necklace.

After drooling over the Cubic Zirconia Beads from Artbeads, I realized the crystals in Grandma's necklace were similar. Using her necklace as inspiration, I designed an edgey, modern version of the necklace for the bleeding heart.

I chose the 6mm connectors in black and garnet.




I used cable chain like my grandmother's but smaller and in sterling silver. I alternated the red and black cubic zirconias and faced the pointed side of the stones outwards giving the necklace an edgey, spikey feel. To soften the edgeyness a bit, I added four vintage stylized red hearts to the end of the string of cubic zirconias.





Both necklace styles show off how versatile cubic zirconias are, they can be classic or combined into an edgey look. Viva la Cubic Zirconia!

Disclosure of Material Connection

Tuesday, November 10, 2009

the bleeding heart

I mentioned a few weeks ago how I was going to a black and white theme and wanted to re-vamp my Etsy. Well, because I wanted a different name, I had to open another shop. I'm calling it the bleeding heart - a play on my political views and the style of jewelry and beads in the shop.

I described my concept to The Teen who came up with the banner.



I like it. Now that the bleeding heart had a shop, she needed a new picture.



I'm going for the edge, have I achieved it?