Gearrings

I’m a big fan of steampunk. For those of you who don’t know what that is, the short answer is Victorian futurism. The long answer involves the Wikipedia definition and a Google image search. I love the fiction and the aesthetic and that inevitably bleed over into my jewelry.

On my many trips to the craft store, I discovered gears in various sizes and several different charms. Below, I give you the variety of gearrings I’ve made so far. I had to mess around with the ring sizes a little bit. Some of the more open gears had a tendency to get jumbled once worn. With a smaller ring connecting the pieces, they have less room to move.

I have to field test whether this will stop the jumbling entirely but I know the hummingbird doesn’t have the room to move anymore.

Current Jams: Stay Out by Nina Nesbitt

All Choked Up

I bought a choker from a fellow chain mailler last summer (the same fellow from MagFest). He told me how the rings worked because they were the same diameter.

Once I got my new pliers in, I thought I’d try making one. I was able to custom order burgundy from The Ring Lord and anyone who grew up outside DC has heard the phrase “I bleed burgundy and gold” from Redskins fans.

I got the clasps off Fire Mountain Gems. I had to do a little research to find the exact ones I needed but I think this will be a popular item for muggles.

I’ll do purple and black once I get the colors in my next order (Go Ravens!). I have to figure out how to do a red, silver, and blue. The pair colors were easy to pull off and the original choker I have has five or six colors. Trios I’d have to lay out ahead to time to decide.

Rockin’ Out To: Break In by Halestorm

Only One Empire Gets a Maille Weave

And it’s the Byzantine. I’ve messed around with once back in December. With the help of a video tutorial, I was able to refresh my memory.

It got a little difficult when I had to continue the chain. You have to add three sets of two every time if you want it to come out properly. I was adding two sets of two instead of three. Rather than give the pattern the rotation, it kept the design going in on direction. I might revisit my original error since it looked interesting but for now, I’m focusing on getting it right.

A friend of mine has requested a bracelet once he found out about my new hobby. From different shop talk I know men generally prefer Half Persians or Double Byzantines. He likes the look of Byzantine but the aspect ratio required for a single results in something small. Fellow maillers have described it as ‘dainty’ and ‘delicate.’ Not optimal for dude jewelry.

When I say Double Byzantine I mean twice the rings, not two of the same chain. (Google Image turns up both results.) I have a bracelet in that weave upstairs so once I’m more comfortable with it I can reverse engineer it. I also need to experiment with how to sync colors in the weave. Now that I know how to do it, I should be able to figure it out through some minor trial and error.

Current Jams: I Knew You Were Trouble. by Taylor Swift

PWNED!1!!!

If you’ve been following along since January, you’re familiar with my continued aggravation with the European 4-in-1 weave.

I’ve always thought there must be a simpler way to do this but it was such an aggravation I never spent too much time thinking about it. Between the chain mailler at Wicked and a video I found while looking for a Byzantine tutorial, I found a simpler way.

Last night I took the European 4-in-1 and made it my bitch. This is evidenced by the bracelet below: 

Rather than connect two sets of five rings like I was taught, you do it one trio at a time. You have to be careful how the center rings align but it’s so much simpler than the ‘traditional’ way. I don’t even have to put it down while I’m working with it.

Pwning To: Iron by Within Temptation

What a Card

I sent in a check and form last week to vend a table at the Bowiefest. It’s the first Saturday in June and is held at Allen Pond Park. I’ll call the person this week to see if they got it. I’m hoping to get a spot in the shade on the main walkway. I may need to get some sort of tent in case it rains.

Since it’s my first show ever I’ll have to do cash. I don’t want to invest in the technology to do credit yet. It’s still pretty early but it might be a good idea for me to get business cards printed up with the blog and (eventually) my etsy page. If they don’t buy something, at least they can look me up.

What design to I want? What should it say? How many should I get printed up? I want the etsy page up and running before I print up the cards. I know I keep talking about this but I want to be able to do my homework and actually read the terms and conditions. I’m planning on doing it on a weekend in March when I have some downtime.

Current Jams: Wide Awake by Katy Perry

Shopping

The oh-so-fabulous chain mailer from Wicked Faire I mentioned in the last entry also told me about a retailer in Colorado. UPS jacked up the shipping out of Canada so it would be handy to have another place to go besides The Ring Lord. They have rainbow niobium rings that I’m madly in love with.

Niobium is a hypoallergenic metal (even more so than anodized aluminum from what I understand) that comes in a variety of gorgeous colors. C & T Designs was the only place I saw that had multiple colors on the same rings.

Because of cost that would have to be a pet project for myself. It doesn’t seem commercially viable to invest too greatly in that material.

Current Tunes: Radioactive by Imagine Dragons

Your Aura Is Inverted

And I couldn’t be happier about it.

I was at Wicked Faire this past weekend. It’s like a con and a Renaissance Festival had a very interesting love child. I met a fellow chain mailer who had several inverted aura earrings on display. She was nice enough to show me how to do the weave.

I saw pictures of the weave on etsy and knew it had to be simple but I couldn’t figure out how to get from rings to finished product. Attempting to guess how to do it resulted in my saying, ‘I’ll worry about this later.’ Once I saw how to do it, it was ridiculously easy but it would be tough to figure out that was what you had to do.

Kitten was fabulous. (Yes, that's her name or at least alias.) Thank you again. Here’s her etsy page if you want to see her stuff in action.

This is what I’ve done so far: 

I’m experimenting with this weave as a necklace in different colors. Once I'm done I'll post some pictures and report back on how it wears.

Weaving To: Beautiful With You by Halestorm

Sold!

I sold my first pair of earrings! 

I was showing off my skills to a coworker and she loved the copper scale earrings. I brought them with me today and I had my first customer. This pleases me greatly. It was a happy Valentine’s Day for everyone.

I also mailed the check and registration for the 2013 Bowiefest. It’s a local craft fair in PG County that happens the first Saturday in June. I’ll have to make sure I’ve got plenty of shinies between then and now. I think I can pull this off.

Ignoring Commercials With: God Only Knows by Joss Stone

Dessert Anyone?

Among the adorable charms I got off the interwebs were these cupcake charms. They were too cute to pass up. When I thought about what colors to put with them I remembered a pair of earrings in what I call ‘birthday cake’ colors: yellow, pink, and blue. I didn’t have yellow so I substituted gold.

The other part I wasn’t sure about was the length. I messed around with different combinations and this was what I came up with.

This was just testing the length. I wasn’t sure how one rosette between the cupcake and main ring would work since I need one through the wire and another through the charm. This is basically that idea with one extra ring for color balance.

This one has sort of a layering affect. It starts and ends with one ring and then has the two rings leading into the three ring middle. I tested it out for a second and it’s got a good bit of drop to it.

Current Music: Private Radio by Vanessa Carlton

Domino

Like I said before, the craft store had some amazing charms including these little dominoes. I messed around with different color combinations. I didn’t pay too much attention to which domino pair went on the earrings. I prefer them a little mixed up.

Current Music: Hometown Glory by ADELE

Working on Scales

I ordered a bunch of small scales in mixed colors and copper. I was inspired by a design I got off etsy in champagne.

These really catch the light. My coworker said the copper was her favorite.

Inspired by my beloved Caps (who kicked Florida’s ass recently in a shut-out), red and blue. I have no idea why the background is so orange here.

Some of the black scales I had were black on both sides. Others were black on one side and silver on the other. Rather than inverting the scales and hanging them like I did on the others, I did all black/silver scales but changing the direction they were facing.

Current Music: Only If For a Night by Florence and the Machine

Black Drops

I saw these as part of a set. I’m hoping to use the other pieces in a mixed metal design at some point. I haven’t seen these little drops at the craft store again. It could be like the hematite beads where they’ll be back but for now, these earrings and a few spares are all I’ve got.

I ordered a grab bag of colors in 18 ¼ and got this matte silver. (I’m sure there’s a more technical term but it’s escaping me.) Because the silver on the black drops isn’t very shiny, they work well together.

The mix of the shiny and matte makes for a very interesting piece. I think the colors complement each other nicely.

I think the light isn’t flattering the colors very well but I think the two shiny colors don’t work as well with the charm. Plus, you kind of lose the effect in the light I had. They just bleed together.

Music: We Are Young by Fun.

Ear-Rings

So I’ve been tooling around with different earring designs. These use the 16 5/16 rings. I’ve combined four rings into a mini-mobius and then layered them. I’ve given aliases to certain color groupings since they remind me of something and I’d like to use the combination again.

Peacock

I liked all of these colors and thought they would go well together but the gold ring served well as a neutral. I think all the colors together are a bit much.

Autumn Colors

Mother Earth

As hippish as that alias sounds, ‘earth’ just didn’t cut it. I liked these colors together a lot more than I anticipated. I’ll definitely be working with them again.

Current Music: I Caught Myself - Paramore

Split Decision

I’ve been meaning to order more chain maille rings for a while but the order got added to recently. Things I need are smaller jump rings (in a variety of colors), larger jump rings (in a smaller variety of colors) and the medium size jump rings (also in a bunch of colors.

I also want to order a couple of colors on an extra small set that’s near impossible for weaves but would be great for creating a simple chain. I could either add charms to create a long necklace or bracelet.

I need new pliers. I currently have one needle nose and one set that’s larger and flatter. The big one is too large to work with the really small rings and the small one concentrates too much force on the large rings scuffing them.

I also need new ear wire. A lot of the stuff I want to do with some of the charms I’ve purchased would be earrings.

I wanted to do one huge order near the end of this month or the beginning of next but I may split it up so I can split up the cost and get some work done with the smaller rings before going big.

Current Jams: Wonderland by Natalia Kills

How Charming

I found a great charm site on Etsy and the clearance rack and Michael’s and went a little overboard. I’m going to order some smaller rings and I need more ear wire but once I’ve got that, I should be able to create some very cute necklaces, earrings, and bracelets.

Charms include: owls, cupcakes, arrows, owls in love, ‘freedom’ handcuffs, pirate flags, flying pigs, fairies, birds, angel wings, crowns, elephants, guitars, and hearts. There’s more but that’s all I could think of off the top of my head.

And no, I don’t have Sheldon Cooper’s memory. I was in the container last night looking for a clasp. (If you don’t know who Sheldon Cooper is, finish reading this entry, tell all your friends, and then go watch Big Bang Theory.)

One of the things I want to make is a flying pig charm bracelet. The chain would be pink and blue which should complement the silver of the pig charms. I’m also planning some steampunk awesomeness since I discovered gears at the craft store. I took a pair of earrings for a test drive and encountered a minor difficulty. I should be able to fix it but I need the smaller rings to test my theory.

I’ll keep you posted. The next charming update should have pictures.

Current Music: My Songs Know What You Did in the Dark by Fall Out Boy

Twists and Turns

I love the spiral weave. It’s simple and very pretty. It also appeals to women who like shiny and nerds who recognize DNA. The only downside is it’s tendency to unspiral. I’m going to see if I can find a way around that.

I bought a large octopus charm during a charm binge and wasn’t sure what I wanted to do with it right away. I’m working a spiral chain that should be long enough to slip over my head. If I can attach it at both ends, I don’t think it will become unspiraled.

I’ll get the chain mostly completed, attach it at one end, twist, attach at other end without untwisting. The last part will likely be harder than making a chain long enough to go over my head.

I already encountered one set back. I wanted to do it in two shades of blue. Once I wove them together it was obvious that they were too close in color. It just looked like one was shiny and the other was more matte.

If you’re combining different colors in a spiral weave, you want some contrast. I had to undo my first effort and switch it out for purple. There’s a much greater contrast and you still have the shiny/matte look.

Current Tunes: Mermaid by Train