Wednesday, February 5, 2014

Pearl Bracelets

Hello everyone!

Since the excitement leading up the to the Christmas season, things have been pretty quiet.  I've been working on refilling stock that's sold as well as coming up with some new designs and new twists on old ones.

Recently I took photographs of everything, so I figured I would post some of them here.

I'll start with the pearl bracelets.  Currently I'm selling these for $20 each.

For those of you who've seen me at markets or the Gifts show, you'll see some familiar colours, but I've also come up with some new ones.  They're all made with seed beads and glass pearls and use a lobster claw clasp with a split ring, so I can add a chain extender if needed.

I restocked my current personal favourites, which had sold out completely: my harlequin colours.


I also tried out a new variation on the harlequin, with solid pearl-finish seed beads rather than the transparent silver-lined ones I use in my original harlequin.


Sticking with the cooler colours, I also have one with iris seed beads and dark grey pearls.


I used iris seed beads in a new design with a lovely springtime lilac pearl.  This will go beautifully with the light purples coming out in spring clothing this year.  I don't know what this will look like on your monitor, but it comes out a little cooler on mine than the pearls look in person, so remember a lilac tone.


If you're more into bolder colours, I also have this fun aqua and black that will be perfect for summer nights.


And if you like blue but want something a little more toned down, I have this bracelet in icy blue seed beats with soft dark grey pearls.


On to warmer tones.  These next ones are also among my favourites.  There's something about the hematite-finish black seed beads and burgundy pearls that seems so very sophisticated and elegant.


I've also used these burgundy pearls in another design with violet seed beads, and the result is spicy and warm.


The violet beads provide a gentle, rich combination with creamy white pearls as well.


Those creamy white beads are also featured against a couple different shades of gold.


If you like a more dramatic, unusual gold look, I've paired gold seed beads with black pearls and dark grey pearls as well.


I have one more set paired up for comparison purposes.  These both feature caramel pearls, but one has a transparent brown seed bead and the other an opaque seed bead with a golden oily finish.


Here's the one with the clear brown beads on its own.  It's such a wonderful, warm, spicy, earthy, honey-golden, burnt caramel combination for summer.


And here's the one with the opaque beads with the oily finish.  I'm completely in love with these beads, so expect to see more of them in the future.






I also have some harlequin style variations in these colour tones.  The first one reminds me of that decorative multicolour corn you get at Thanksgiving/harvest festival/fall fair time.


I call this next combination caramel cream swirl.


This next one is closest to my first harlequin design in that it criss-crosses dark transparent seed beads with lighter pearls and light transparent seed beads with darker pearls.


And this one is the "flip" of the previous one in that I paired dark beads with dark pearls and light beads with light pearls, but otherwise makes use of exactly the same beads.


And that's my full range of this style of bracelet at present.  Posting this now, I'm realizing there are a couple popular colour combos I still need to replace, though it was very fun coming up with some new ones.

I'll probably post necklaces next.  You'll notice when I do that there's a more limited range of colours with those, and that's just because it takes much much longer to make a necklace than a bracelet so I'm less inclined to experiment at that length.  If you see a bracelet colour combo here that you'd like to see in a necklace, please tell me and I will be more than happy to make a necklace in those colours for you.