The not-so-violet violets brooch

I just realised I've never shown this brooch on this blog. Not that it's such a masterpiece it just had to be featured, it's just that it's a little brooch that I enjoyed making years ago. And it has a good idea for all newbies at bead embroidery who want to bead a pendant, brooch or similar: using larger beads will make it much faster. In this case, it also makes the brooch more lightweight as I used mainly acrylic components.

For this brooch, which has a black felt base, I used acrylic/lucite flowers and leaves, pushing a few smaller florals under the violets to fill out the space.  I then added a backing and pin and covered the edges with Toho marbled seeds.

Organza flower brooch

I mentioned making this brooch on a forum, but didn't have any photos to show. Well, now there are a couple of pics. It's my first assembled "burnt organza" flower, though I've made petals before that I never got around to stitching together.

This is a really simple flower. I cut about a dozen irregular circles in four sizes from a wide Mokuba organza ribbon, melted the edges over a candle and then stacked the ruffled petals. Then I stitched a few white opal seeds to the centre and added a brooch pin to the back. I can't decide if I think it looks like an old-fashioned rose, a peony or a ranuclus flower.

I only had white organza to play with. It looks nice, really romantic wedding style, but I want to use other colours too. Want to make more substantial and less ethereal flowers, if you know what I mean.


There are many places online where you can learn to various kinds of "burnt" organza flowers: Little Birdie Secrets, Engageology, Reese Dixon, Cut Out + Keep, What You Make It, You Can't Take It With You. Sew4Home have both instructions and templates. Mad Mim have three different tuts: The Burnt Edges Criss-Cross Flower, The Burnt Petal Flower and The Burnt Edges Circle Flower. And then there's YouTube of cause with videos like e.g. How to Make a Pretty Organza Flower and Rayon/Organza Flower Technique. In this one a Cuttlebug is used to cut the circles -- saves time when you don't have to cut them yourself.

I've got a few other styles of organza flowers planned. Not sure how they'll turn out, but I have a semi-finished chrysanthemum. Inspired by a ribbon flower project by Helen Gibb.

Purple jewellery to show support

On one of the Swedish jewellery-making forums I'm active, Smyckestillverkning iFokus, the founder recently announced a little challenge: make purple jewellery for October 27. The reason? An appeal to wear something purple that day to show HBT youths that you accept them for who they are, that you support them and that it's ok to be gay, bisexual or transsexual. There isn't anything wrong with them, they aren't weird or perverts, as some people seem to think, looking at gay people in distaste. And, perhaps most importantly, it gets better!

The background is of cause the five suicides in the U.S., where the gay boys gave up on life after being harassed just because they weren't "straight". But it isn't just in the U.S. that HBT teenagers, and adults, attempt to comit suicide because of the way certain individuals in society look at them. So on Wednesday we can do this one simple thing to show that we like them for who they are.

For this challenge I've made two pieces. First, a simple flower necklace I put together last night. It features light violet acrylic (lucite) flowers with elongated drop glass beads as "stamen" that I attached to a jump ring, forming a small clustre. I wanted to string the clustre on purple cord or wire, but didn't have anything that matched the purple nuances in the flower. So instead I did something I normally don't like to do: I just strung some Toho 8/0 seed beads on beading wire. (Why I don't like to do that? It looks cheap, like some tat you can buy for pin money. No disrespect to those that do string seeds like this in their jewellery making.) The colour is called sugarplum, a cooler purple that e.g. amethyst.


While shooting the necklace, I felt an urge to do something more. Something to show how easy, how uncomplicated, it is to make a quick piece of jewellery for a special occassion.

The result was a simple brooch, that you can wear on a jumper, coat, hat, scarf or where ever you feel it will be visible. Three paper flowers, sealed for durability, are held together by a flower-shaped brad, which I've attached to a brooch back. The petals of the brad are bent a bit for a better shape and to keep it from pushing on the paper petals as it causes them to curve backwards.


To attach the brad, I simple "wrapped" it over the bar of the narrow brooch back. Squeezed it with my pliers and burnished it slightly. It seems to be sturdy enough. If not, I could always add a drop of glue for added security.


The challenge entries can now be uploaded at a special gallery thread at the forum. It is encouraged to write a short description in both Swedish and English. You can find the thread here: Den lila kampanjen.

Pink anemone brooch

I really like these lovely big acrylic/lucite flowers. That's why I bought this one eventhough pink is not my favourite colour.

This just a very simple brooch I made by knotting the acrylic flower to a large coconut button -- it had a perfect curve for letting the flower nest in the middle -- and then adding a few matte crystal long magatama beads in the centre. I think it suits the season with its soft spring colours.

Old brooches

No, I haven't made these. I found then on a shelf in big warehouse, selling all things used and cheap things new. I fell for the tiny details in them -- and the price was so low I just had to buy them. The one on the left has a broken mechanism and the one on the right is yellow with age and stains, but still not something to be forgotten on a steel shelf, bunched together with cheap plastic jewellery and all kinds of crap.

Imagine having the patience to do such tiny half cross stitches as in the embroidered brooch. Or assemble the tiny pieces in the micro-mosaic brooch. Below is a second pic of the rose brooch with a ruler as reference -- do you see how tiny those stitches are?!


But my all time favourite brooch is my sterling silver cat that I found as a kid at an antiquity show. I had to plead a bit with my parents to be allowed to buy it, but since it was real silver and a lovely motif they agreed it was a good buy.


My dad's oldest sister aswell as his mum died long before I was born so my sister and I grew up with many things they left behind, including some costume jewellery. My parents don't come from wealthy families, but everyone could afford a few trinkets to adorn themselves. They are not precious, but playing with them as a kid it still felt like real jewels. Broken an bent, the brooches were still treasures.


That's a project for the future, perhaps restore them to their old beauty.

Remembering summer

I like making brooches: they are not too time-consuming to make compared to e.g. necklaces and they can be worn in so many different ways. This brooch, so hard to capture on photo, was one I made this summer for a bead shop contest on the theme Sea.

Can you spot what I have used as a background? About the same time as Sirlig announced the contest, they added a new product to their shop: fluffy organza jewellery bags. Reading the theme of the contest and seeing the newly added product, I couldn't stop thinking of the fluffy bags as waves and frothy seafoam. Of cause I had to think of a way to incorporate one of those bags in my entry!

It doesn't show well on photo, but what I did was to trim the edges of the bag and remove the strings, then stitch it to my interfacing. I made sure to ruffle the organza so it would form dimensional ridges and waves, raising from the surface.

In between the ridges I added beads, like enamel is added to the cells in cloisonné: bright blue-and-green glass chips, turquoise and green ice pearls and a few crackled blue-dyed rock crystal chips. A tiny glass fish bead was also added. The chips were stitched on with the holes parallel to the surface rather than having the holes point up and secured with stop stitches. This make it all more dimensional and make sure the most colourful sides of the chips face outwards (they are dyed so most of the colour is around the outer perimeter and very little around the hole).

Egyptian Revival my way

I will keep posting pics of jewellery I've made during the last year. This set was a little something I made for a forum contest at Smyckestillverkning iFokus, on the time Antiken (the Ancient times). Didn't win, but didn't finish last either. Photos of the winner and runner-up can be found here and all the entries a posted in this thread.

The set is called Sol och måne över Nilen, Sun and Moon over the river Nile. It is not directly inspired my antique jewellery, but rather has more in common with the egyptian revival trend of the early 20th century. The set is made using brass and czech glass in a variegated turquoise.

I chose Egypt as they were known for loving jewellery in those days -- and they had a cat goddess. Most famous for the wide beaded collars, but rich and poor alike also used many other types of jewellery: necklaces, rings, amulets, bracelets, cuffs, ankle bracelets, tiaras/hair ornaments and earrings.

First I made the earrings with lotus motifs in both the chandeliers and beads. The lotus is a flower filled with symbolics for the Egyptians and often portraited in egyptian art and mythology. What make it stand out from other flowers is the fact that it was seen as as symbol of both the sun and the moon.

Egyptians did use glass beads, but not this kind of czech pressed-glass, but the unusual style of ear cuffs actually has its origin in the Antique Macedonia -- mixing cultures here. Very discrete and comfortable even it it doesn't look that way on photo.

I also choose to add a brooch, a modern interpretation of the amulets worn in those days. A beautiful, large scarab with a glossy MOP pendant, which is meant to symbolize the rising sun that the scarab lifts in a well-known pose. I glued it to the back of the brass stamping and added a brooch pin. The hind legs of the beetle was bent towards each other until they met. This gave me a way of adding a lotus bead dangle. The brooch can also be used as a focal in a necklace.

Last but not least, I didn't want to abandon the second scarab I bought for the contest. I made a failed attempt at a bead necklace and realised I'd probably be nice to use just as a simple pendant, suspended on a thin brass chain. That way it would fit the rest of the set better.


PS! I have collected links to instructions on this and other types of ear cuffs here.