Coiled

A couple of years ago, when I was still experimenting with different types of jewelry making techniques, trying to find the one that would suit me best, I made several coiled earrings and earring/pendant sets, as a way of perfecting my wire wrapping skills.

I'm posting the designs here, as I'm thinking of revisiting the technique sometime in the future, and I want to have the old ones at hand, for comparison.

Here's a montage of my coiled designs, all shapes and forms:

Teardrops

Two entries back I started grouping my older designs based on basic forms, shapes and design elements.

After spirals, leaves, flowers and branches I'll continue with teardrops - a very popular and quite versatile form, which lends itself to a variety of design possibilities.

I've created all kinds of teardrop shaped earrings and pendants in the past two years, but my favorites are the ones that include some woven element...

Here are my best pieces:

Inspired by Nature

Nature is an endless source of inspiration: I've made branches, leaves, flowers, tree of life pendants and even DNA-themed earrings and necklaces.

For the latter, my favorite design, I got the original idea from a pair of earrings my friend, Aniko Sandor made a number of years back,   I took from her the idea of twisting a long rectangular frame into a double-helix, but I used different techniques to fill out the frame, with visually very distinctive  results.

"Double Helix" Earrings:

"Double Helix" Necklaces:

Branches. My fingers hurt so badly after days of weaving this set, I don't think I'll ever venture to make anything similar to it. And I like the result so much, I might never be able to part with it.
 

Woven Leaves:

And flowers:

Spirals

I was thinking of a way of "showcasing" my older designs here...

And what's a better way to displaying them than grouping the designs by theme...

So let's start with one of the basic design element: the spiral - sometimes as the central element of the design, sometimes as a smaller motif incorporated in the design.

Rays

In my previous entry I mentioned the "sunray" theme, and I felt I needed to elaborate a little on it.
 
This is a design element where a series of rays start out from a row of beads, ending on a (semi)circle, resembling to some degree the sun in children's drawings. Although the rays restrict the design possibilities a little bit, they also have an effect of low-keyed elegance. That doesn't mean you can't play with the color scheme, the shape of the frames, and use of metals, maybe even mixing them.
 
Here are a few creations in this style:

Flame

Lightly oxidized copper and carnelian... it might seem like an obvious choice, but I think the more elaborate designs don't allow for too much experimentation with color.

Sun-drenched, sunburned, sun-kissed... I'm happy to have found a new interpretation for the "sunray" theme.

The bright copper beads are a nice contrast to the more earthy tone of the antiqued copper.