My site has moved! I’m now posting most of my stuff to http://clockworkprincess.webs.com/, if you’re interesting in seeing more of my work.
Made this new necklace today – the flowers are seed beads on wire. I think it works pretty well, and if I wasn’t so lazy I would have made more flowers to go round the choker, rather than chain. I like bead weaving, but it always takes so much time!
Here’s the pattern for the flowers, from the book ‘A Treasury of Beaded Jewelry’ by Mary Ellen Harte. I really recommend this book, it has a lot of good patterns in it.
I love this company – Xyclopa. They make glorious Steampunk creations out of laser-cut wood – for example this clockwork heart pendant.
Also check out their ‘A Young Mad Scientist’s First Alphabet Blocks’. They’re incredibly cute.
According to Xylocopa’s website, the images on the blocks stand for:
A – Appendages
B – Bioengineering
C – Caffeine
D – Dirigible
E – Experiment
F – Freeze ray
G – Goggles
H – Henchmen
I – Invention
J – Jargon
K – Potassium
L – Laser
M – Maniacal
N – Nanotechnology
O – Organs
P – Peasants (with Pitchforks)
Q – Quantum physics
R – Robot
S – Self-experimentation
T – Tentacles
U – Underground Lair
V – Virus
W – Wrench
X – X-Ray
Y – You, the Mad Scientist of Tomorrow
Z – Zombies
It’s not often that I know exactly where I got the inspiration for a design from, but in this case I saw the cameo and immediately thought of the Robert Browning poem, ‘My Last Duchess’, because the girl in the portrait looks so alive.
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- Close-up of the pendant
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- You can see the necklace laid out here
The cameo pendant was originally a brooch – I knocked off the back, sanded it, and drilled some holes with a hand-drill. I’m not sure I’ve done the cameo justice – might well go back and redo this necklace at some point.
Here’s a link to the poem itself, if you’re interested:
My Last Duchess – Robert Browning
Welcome to my site. My name is Hannah Wray, and I live in the UK. I am a freelance jewelery artist in my spare time – I make original pieces and repair old ones to give them a new lease of life. My influences include steampunk, baroque and the natural world.
