Im back!

Wow, didn't realize that i had been ignoring my blog for so long. Sorry! But it has been a busy few weeks, first I was my friends Bridesmaid and i have now been running around organizing my display for the exhibition that I am taking part in at artspace in Durban. And while doing that i have been making jewellery.

Flavours is an exhibition by Durban emerging jewellers which is going to be held at artSpace on Monday the 13th July at 18.00 so please, if you are in or from the Durban area, come and have a look. The exhibition will run until the 1st August.
This is the exhibition that we have all been preparing for.

Below are a few new pieces that I have been making over the last few weeks.

These earrings are made of black wooden disks, the red beads at the top are real coral beads, then silver wire work on top with a silver flower.

This a bracelet that I made from stained wooden round disks and a T bar clasp, the T bar is decorated as a flower garden.

This a new wooden pendant that I made with forged wire and silver flowers.

New Piece 2!

Its been a long day but I have finally finished my new piece and very excited about how it turned out. I found a few wooden beads that I had brought a while back and decided that they would be perfect for the new bracelet. I then started cutting them in half and they fitted perfectly in the curves that I wanted them to. I then had to make a of how the wooden half beads would stay in place so I made pins that were soldered to the bracelet and the pin went into a small hole on the other side of the bead and glued together for extra strength.

My New Piece!

OK, so Ive been a bit off lately and now I'm getting back on track with things. I started making this piece, it started as just a wire bracelet but I have now decided to add more to it. I decided there was too much metal so now I trying to add wood to it to incorporate my natural or organic material for it to stick to my theme.

What Your Flavour!

My flavour is nature, it beauty and glorious nature, something that God has created.

Nora Fok

Nora Fok's work really fascinates me. Her work is inspired by different aspects of nature. She manily uses non-precious materials. She likes to emphasize craft and artisty. Nora creates wearable pieces from dyed nylon that she weaves, knots, tied and knitted.

Sharon Church

One of the artist that I have found very interesting is Sharon Church. Most of her pieces are inspired by the plants in her garden. All her pieces are very rich in symbolic and has significance. She says, "natural world is symbolic of life with its cycles of growth, decay, death and renewal."

Making More Bangles!

At the moment, I working on trying to make the wooden bangles thinner, because I feel that my bangles at the moment are too wide and with thinner widths the bangles are more for market than for statement pieces. I wanting to cut it in half.

Processing Thoughts!

Over the last few days I have been working on a project that takes a lot of time, wire and hammering. I have made a few wooden bangles and am not working on the wire work for the top of the bangle. I'm hoping that the wire work will resemble veins for a plant.

Making a wooden bangle!

Over the last week I have been thinking about making my own wooden bangles and using my designs to incorporate the wooden bangles. So I started on a long search for the equipment. First I had to ask around on who had a bench drill and from there I had to find out where I could find the drills I was looking for. I had to buy a set of round tube drills, which was a little bit expensive, but if you buy them in a set it worked out cheaper than buying them separately.

While setting up the bench drill, you have to make sure every thing is lined up well otherwise if while drilling and the drill isn't lined up you could hit the drill with the steal stand, making the drill blunt.

Once cutting the outside I use a vice to hole the solid piece but I don't make it too hard because once the inside is cut out I was scared the it would snap, so I don't crank it too tight. Once the middle is cut you have a bangle that just needs tons of sanding.

More Private Work!

Over the december holidays I was asked to make a few different items.

First was a pendant for a family member, she had bought the stones on Bidorbuy. A website that as acutions every Wednesday in South Africa. She had gotten a blue topaz and an unusual shaped opal. Stunning stones. She wanted them set in white gold but because she couldn't afford white gold, so we set them in silver instead.

This next piece was half my design and half the customers design, she wanted a bracelet, but big, bold and chunky yet not a complicated design. She like a pendant I made in 2nd year where I made a dome and made glass beads to be suspended in the middle of the dome.

The bracelet is made of many dome and instead of the glass bead, I made silver beads that went inside the domes, once I had soldered the domes together, it became a battle to slighlty bend the domes to fit the shape of the wrist, it was a challenge but a good one and I think it came out very well and I love it so much that I want to make one for myself.

Above is my 2nd year piece.and the bracelet I helped design and made.

The next ring I made was also a challenge, for the first time in my life I got to make or should I say alloy Rose Gold. It was difficult but now I know the secret to making rose gold. The rose gold strip is placed over a silver band. But what had happened was that I had filed a grove into the silver band thinking that it would prevent the rose gold band from coming off the silver band, and then in the process I landed up making the rose gold band spin like a stress ring, was not what I wanted but when the customer saw it and started playing with it she was happy. So we didnt change it.

Creations Over The Xmas Holidays

Well this last season has been short but on the other hand too long! I have been really busy over the last couple of months.

At the beginning of our hoilday in November, there where a few of us from tech that were getting together and where trying to sell some of our jewellery at the "I heart market" in Durban, the last 3 weekends before Christmas and with that we where all busy trying to make as much stock as we could.

These are a few pieces that I have made and am hoping to sell. From the market I did recieve alot of feed back from poeple that had taken my card and are wanting once off pieces.

Private Jobs.

In amongst everything else with the end of year so and preparing for it I have been very busy in private jobs for my own customers. The first piece, A friend of mine owns a farm and carved a small piece of wood into a heart for his girlfriend and he wanted it to be a pendant, so I made the pieces to make it into a pendant. I found myself loving the idea of wooden pendant that have been carved and so I'm going to start trying to carve wood for myself or at least shape it.





The second piece is my best friends engagement ring, I was so excited when her boyfriend phoned me to ask if I would make the ring. I think that it just made it that little more special as her friend made it, He proposed last night at bible study infront of everyone and she cant stop looking at it and showing it off. I'm so glade that she likes it. This isn't a very good photo, but I have told her she has to bring it back so I can take a better photo.

End of Year Show.

At the end of every year we have a show to display our work that we had done over the past year. It's very stressful and nerves are in the air and people start to panic about displays and stands for the jewellery.Below is my display for this years end of year show. I made a glass box to encase my jewellery.

Here are a few of my friends with their displays.
This is Jadi Clark and her jewellery is all about interactive colourful jewellery, she mostly makes fun and colourful jewellery.

This is Kelly,

And this is Lusanda.

Show case!

At the end of every year the third and fourth years have and end of year show. The third years get to show their new personal project pieces and the fourth years get to show what they have done over their the year or years. This year I have made a glass box to put over my pieces, with a lock on. The steel frame is from my mothers work. the reps at her work said that if I could use it then take it. As to you can see from the picture below, there are a few lings that I'm wanting to change on the steel frame itself. Because my work is all about nature and the purity of it I have decided to put flowers around the steel bottom to make it look like a garden theme. On the wall behind my stand I'm going to put photos of my other pieces as I'm not putting all my pieces into the show case otherwise it will be too crowded.

Wooden Ring!

I just got this sudden burst of inspiration with the wooden disks that I have been using. I have so many ideas that I have found myself stumped on where to start.

I made a ring below of wood and silver wires act as veins holding the wood. The way the veins interlink is to represent the confusing feeling I have when there is just too much that has to be done and I don't know where to start.

More Wood!

I've sort of been on my own mission lately and trying to Incorporated new materials to my jewellery. When I made that first pair of wooden earrings I realized that I enjoyed working with wood and had more pieces that I wanted to make, its like designs have been pouring out my head, I have so many ideas there's just not enough time in the day to get them out and the more I working the more ideas keep popping into my head.
I been wearing my wooden earring and have been given orders for them and now I have to try keep up with not only my head but also the orders.
Below are a few more jewellery pieces that I have made. One of the girls that I work with asked for a pendant that matched the earrings that I made last week.

Pendant made of wood with small silver flowers riveted and a mother of pearl flower carved shell in the middle hanging off a brown organza ribbon.

Wooden earrings cut to a pear shape with small silver flowers riveted to the wood. They so light you forget that you have them on. I feel that they simple yet elegant.

This is another pair that I have just made, the only problem with these are that they are sightly heavy on the ear. They that the two different shades of wood giving them that contrast and they have two small silver flowers riveted and that the mother of pearl shell carved flowers.

The next two pairs of earrings are just plain silver flowers that I made into studs and little sweet dangle earrings. They very light and I feel they are a bit to plain for my liking but I have a few orders from friends and family for them. So they work I guess.