Visual Coziness

A home should be warm and loving and most of all cozy.  Throw quilts to cuddle under when the rain decides to make a surprise visit and keep everyone inside.  The lingering smell of a meatloaf in the oven or baking chocolate chip cookies.  Somewhere that provides a safe haven and place of security.  Where it’s okay to be yourself even if it’s not entirely “proper” under society’s standards.

My studio is really just my childhood desk in my room, but it’s situated in front of my balcony sliding door where I have a view of the rolling north Orange County hills and a few transmission towers.   It can be a bit crammed at times, but it’s home for my jewelry. The sun shines in very nicely and has made me biased against artificial lighting for my jewelry photos.  This is a sample shot of what I get if I keep the blinds closed and move one just right.

Early to mid-morning is my favorite time to sit at my desk and cultivate my muse.  The afternoon sun gets a little too strong to make anything because I’m afraid of fading out my room.  I’ve figured out how to protect the He-Man DVDs, so technically I’m good now.   Yes, I love He-Man and She-Ra and I will never apologize for it.

Anyway, that’s why I started liking the photos I’d take of a finished piece causally strewn across my desk with tools and various jewelry supplies peeking out.

It definitely gives it a more personal, homey feel to it all.  Photographing jewelry is a creative art all by itself.  I’ve been lucky to be able to both create jewelry and nicely capture them in photos.  Shots like these are easier to connect with, I think.  It’s more human.

Thinking of the Future

I really want to spend some time figuring out how to approach galleries and boutiques with my jewelry. I need to grow my business and see where it goes. I would really like to make this my sole source of income someday. but I think requires a less demanding day job even though I’ve survived through the past 4 years.

Selling online still requires a personal connection and I think my descriptions help with that. Who else would be crazy enough to reference the 3 bears or Avalon? Seriously. I love writing my descriptions. It struck the writing muse inside of me that’s been dormant for years because I never had enough vocabulary or plotlines. This is awesome. Now all I really have left to do is to take more and better pictures and fix my laptop so I can have the pieces I’m listing right next to me so I can measure it out correctly without constantly running up and down the stairs.

These are definitely exciting times.

Music to Cultivate Creativity

In order to truly cultivate right-brain activity, music should contain no words because words are associated with left-brain activity.  I’ve been taking this into consideration whenever I’m looking to create something new.  I have a few albums that are just instrumentals… I really love Emilie Autumn’s Laced/Unlaced album.  She’s awesome on the violin.  Then I have an instrumental Buffy the Vampire Slayer for key moments throughout the series.  Gotta love that music.  Let’s see… I have Jill Tracy, whom I absolutely adore.  I saw her live at Gothla last year and I adore her “Doomsday Serenade”.  Awesome piano playing.  I need to load the new Legend of the Seeker soundtrack onto my iPhone… Jo LoDuca does it again with a wonderful score that I’ve loved since I was a teenager watching Hercules and Xena.

I just picked up the first 5 soundtracks for Harry Potter.  I figured I could try that out and see what happens.

I’m Finally on Etsy

I caved in and started an Etsy site…

You know, it’s actually been quite liberating and I’ve been learning more about myself as I write these crazy descriptions of jewelry.  It’s fun and I get to reveal even more of my quirky personality.  Maybe that’s the way to lure people in to buy stuff, maybe not, but as long as I’m having a good time with it, that’s what matters.

Ooo Shiny!

Well, this is the only recent picture of any worth… been a bit busy with life to really get back behind the camera.  “Storm Watch 2010″ hasn’t been helping with my natural photography lighting.   Oh well, back to talking about this lovely necklace.

So when I design necklaces like these, exclusively incorporating my favorite lampwork beads, I start with the focal bead and then go from there.  Typically, I like to start by choosing some kind of stone to use in the necklace, simply because I’m a rock hound at heart.  This time I actually started by choosing the Swarovski crystal color first, and honestly, I have a lot of crystal in various sizes in this particular purple.  I figured I could put some to good use.   I started toying with the crystal, throwing in bits of chainmaille here and there but it was too purple!  I needed more color to help tie into the necklace.  This was Friday night and I didn’t pick it back up until Sunday night.  Something in the back of my head told me to use the new smoky quartz beads I just got in the mail that week… and volia!  It was a perfect fit.  And here’s the finished product…

Something Magical Comes This Way

The weather in Southern California has been nothing but wonderful.  The skies are blue, the sun is shining, and the birds are singing in the trees.  It’s a magical time only this time of year brings.

On that note, I’ve gotten 2 necklaces with my favorite lampwork bead focals started and waiting to be finished.  Inspiration like this does not come often, and perhaps it is the universe’s way of apologizing for all the doo doo nuggets Mercury in Retrograde has been throwing at me.  Regardless, this is a very nice change and I hope it continues.  It’s interesting to watch the creative process unfold right before your very eyes.

Someday I hope to have a room dedicated as my studio space.  It’s a long ways away from here, but definitely a dream to fulfill someday.  Something on the east side so the early morning sun lights up the room like a beacon.  My childhood bedroom used to be on the east side of the house, so the sun would filter in through the blinds and wake me up naturally.  It was a beautiful sight to behold and there are times when I really miss that room.

I’ll post pictures when I’ve finished both necklaces… shouldn’t take too long, but it’s become all boring left-brain work now.

Harmony Bracelet – Garnet

This is my new Harmony bracelet.  I call it Harmony because it’s a perfect combination of chainmaille, stones, and Swarovski crystal.  It’s the best of both the natural world and the world of science.  Stone lovers regard anything man-made mixed with stones as an abomination.  I like to find harmony between the two worlds.  I found it here.

Red garnet, red-green garnet, and 2 shades of red Swarovski crystal.

Happy New Year!

OMG, I’ve been so busy and not posting anything here at all… shame on me. /slap

Yes, so I’m expecting 2010 to be an awesome year and the beginning of an awesome decade!  I have some new jewelry techniques I’ve been perfecting and I cannot wait to show off what I’ve made.  I’d better charge that camera to take some pictures.

That’s all for now, folks.  Bye for now.

Natural Lighting

Natural lighting is so much better than artifical light. Either that or I’m using the wrong lighting system. I discovered this tonight as I quickly tried to take some extra pictures for my latest jewelry portfolio. Nope, natural lighting wins hands down. And I should be sleeping at this time of night anyway. The Santa Ana winds are picking up… Hopefully they won’t start any fires.

The Lure of Crystal

My sister is getting married the last weekend before Christmas.  Everything will be blinged out so much that reps from Swarovski should come out and be blinded.   Something hit me last night and I got bitten by the bling bug.  In the past few years, I’ve moved away from the Swarovski leaded bling and diverted towards more natural bling.  Of course, I always revisit my love for crystal, but today I’m craving it like chocolate.  It’s crazy and inspiring all at the same time. 

My love of crystal began as a pre-teen when my sister and I would shop at our favorite bead store in Downtown LA.  Mind you, we were still going for glass beads and abalone inlay set in base metal charms.  Usually hearts and butterflies.  But there was always a group of ladies picking a number and waiting to shop along the walls.  Curious, we grabbed a number to see what exactly was so coveted along the walls… oops.  And that’s when we discovered Swarovski crystal.  32% leaded crystal engineered so specifically to make any engineer proud.  It sparkled like jewels in a storybook.  We were immediately hooked and started buying colors and sizes by the dozen.  Then, before I started college, the crystal bug bit yet again, and we went back to buy crystal in gross, instead of dozens.  1 gross = 12 dozen.  Our other sister bought tiny little bracelets of crystal that we could easily make ourselves.  So that started the crystal bug again, and buying by the gross was so much more exciting than by the dozen.  Fast forward another 3 years when the crystal bug bit me and stayed for another few years.  I found an Internet supplier with AMAZING prices.  Oops again.  That turned into SEVERAL gross… I remember I’d take a break from studying by opening a factory package of crystal and just going “Ooo” and “aaah” over it.  Best thing ever.  As a child, I loved my crystal so much… as an adult, that childlike wonder still exists whenever I carefully open a factory package of crystal and run my hands through it… /drool

Yes, I am a magpie.  I like rocks and shiny things.