Aotearoa Neckpiece

Aotearoa (pronounced [ao tea roa]) is the most widly known and accepted Māori name for New Zealand. It is used by both Māori and non-Māori.

I was invited to contribute to a group show at 'Quoil Contemporary Jewellery Gallery' in Wellington, NZ (www.quoil.co.nz) the title of which is 'Aotearoa'. It needed to be a neckpiece with earrings.

To me (being a recent migrant to this beautiful country), NZ equates to sheep, wool, blue coastline, lush green grass, paua shell and the native Māori peoples. Quite a simplistic view, but hey that's me!

I wanted to combine my love of spinning, which is something I have recently learnt how to do here in NZ on a NZ made spinning wheel, with a wearable piece of jewelry.

First I dyed some polwarth sheep wool and kid mohair locks using blues and greens. Then I spun it into yarn adding in pieces of paua shell along the way.

The centerpiece is a vintage (1940s) 'blinking' dolls eye which I am using to represent the Māori peoples. The eye is set into Faux bone using UV resin with tiny fine silver beads and gold plated washers and vintage pink glass shards.

 I am quite happy with how it turned out. Its definately something that I would wear. I made simple earrings to match with oxidised sterling silver.

 

  

Dewdrop Felted Ring

I am on a roll today - managed to finish this ring too! Mainly because this was the first day my son (who is 2-and-a-bit) started preschool. He will go 2 mornings a week and so give me a good few hours of daylight time to get some 'making stuff' done. Especially stuff involving hammering and sawing.

My little girl is still at home (just turned 5 last week) but she was on the sofa feeling ill quietly. She's looking a bit spotty and has a temp, so it may well be chickenpox.

The ring base is Faux bone with sterling silver tube rivets. Then I made a wire frame & needle felted and wet felted the wool fibers (with a bit of sari, silk, bamboo & glitzy stuff) in and around it.

After that I coated it in UV resin and then inspired by the Super Secret Stevie B technique (aka the S3) - the highly secret way of achieveing a gloss finish by spraying your piece with a can of 'Gloss Finish'.

Then to finish, I added some sterling wire wrapped spinel gemstones (and oxidised the silver).

Finally, a BIG thanks to Grand Purl Baa for the Blogger formatting tips. Updating my formatting settings worked a treat!

And now off for a cuppa!

Eye Cry Silver Tears

Another sad one - with vintage 1940s 'blinking' dolls eye.

This time I made it darker by antiquing the sterling silver 'tears' with liver of sulphur.

Also with copper, purple merino wool, natural raw diamonds, Faux bone & UV resin with purple glitter.

I have a whole drawerful of different colours of glitter in tiny pots (mica powders mainly) & I refuse to let my little girl use any. Its more expensive than the stuff at kindy! She gets most upset & accuses me of being Mean Mummy.

Well at least thats an idea for Santa? Must write it down before I forget.....

Happy Horny Fungi Ring

I am really happy about how the colours came out in this one. Constructed from merino wool which I first wet felted and then needle felted. I also used UV resin at the base of the felted structure with natural rough diamonds.

The ring base is Faux Bone with sterling silver tube rivets.

The ring size is a US 7.5 and stands about 12cm above the wearer's finger.

2 Finger Salute

This ring isn't finished yet, in fact its just the beginning of the process - I thought it would be fun to show some work-in-progress?

I've got the basic Faux bone ring base done and got the wool roving wet felted on and then I've needle felted it to give it some shape and harden it up.

I was trying to get the same shape as my Anemone ring - but the wool had WAY different ideas! I looks like its giving me the Two Finger Salute.
I think it will end up quite a fun one? Fingers crossed.

Faux Bone - loving it!

I've been experimenting with Faux Bone - a type of non-toxic PVC. Its great stuff - you can saw it, drill it, hammer it, texture it, heat and bend it (just don't burn it - that releases yucky fumes) and put resin in it. To get the 'bone' effect you rub brown shoes polish on it - then rub it off and sand it when its reached the desired 'age'.

This is a brooch I've made with etched copper frame, craft wire in pink, crystal quartz heishi and metal silevr coloured beads (Fair Trade from Ethipia). And brass micro-screws (I also LOVE micro-screws - must be the engineer in me.....)!

The gorgeous stone is a porcelain jasper from Heart of Stone Studio in the US.