I have this marvelous friend (many, actually.... but I digress) from my life in Florida. We'll call her Cy. I met Cy in a restaurant I waited and bartended in and she, her husband and I became fast friends. Over the years, she's also become a patron of sorts to my artwork. She's incredibly encouraging, supportive, and honest. I don't tell her directly enough, but I appreciate it more than words can say. She's ordered pieces from me with the caveat of "just make it the way you want to, I love what you do." In a "have it your way" world, that is a rare kind of faith for a custom artist to encounter!
A few months ago, Cy sent me a little envelope of pretty little trinkets. They were pieces of jewelry, some of her favorites, that she had loved and worn to destruction. Once again, she sent faith in a note asking me to rework them the way I'd like. The best part? There was no time limit. They sat, I swished through them with an index finger from time to time. I kept willing them to talk to me. The darned little pieces were mute. Then about a month ago, I received my favorite form of inspiration: The Rio Grande catalog. Rio Grande is one of my favorite piece/parts sources and I've been known (pre-kids) to sit and drool over its pages for weeks at a time. Now that I've got two marvelous distractions running about my house at full tilt, I take it a page here and a page there. My head was dancing with beautiful metals and fantastic ideas. The little pile of bits started practically shaking itself off the countertop. I pulled up the website, ordered some raw materials and waited. By the time they came in, I had one of the items worked out more or less in my head. It was a beautiful drop pendant of a cherry blossom branch, complete with flowers. The only issues I had with it was that it was vertically oriented and of an unknown material. I wouldn't dare hit it with a torch, lest I melt, discolor or deform it. I really wanted it to be horizontal. I also had some beautiful oblong pearls in dark shades that had been part of a pair of earrings. I was going to add them into the piece with the cherry branch, but once I wired it to the new, lovely chain I purchased, I couldn't bring myself to add anything else.
Next I needed to figure out what to do with the lovely pearls I was going to add to the necklace. I was originally planning to make a single piece out of the bits, but I was now looking at two distinct items. I purchased ball ended headpins to work the pendant onto the necklace and had many left over. I slid a pearl onto one and started noodling around. I added another pearl to a second headpin and ended up doing a sort of stack/twist feel with the two. Then I added another and yet one more. It looked great! Problem was, once you make the first earring, you have to make a duplicate. I worked, reworked, ripped apart and finally came up with an organically matching pair.
The last items from the pile were originally part of a pair of earrings with the pearls. They were a jade colored faceted pear shaped drops. They were dreadfully silent. At one point in our back and forth conversations, I mentioned this to Cy and she told me not to worry about it, just do what I could and she'd be happy (see? a dream client!!). A day or two later I was scrolling though Facebook and saw a beautiful colorway on some hand dyed yarn. It was jade and purple and it created a eureka moment. It was time to add a little old school Quiet Sky to the mix. I worked up a rosette pattern in purple rings and wired the stones, which had VERY tiny drill holes, to Argentium silver rings. It came together beautifully.
Cy has since written to me to let me know how happy she is with her pieces. I'm thrilled as I was super happy with them as well.
