Hot metals are everywhere, after the rose gold watches we have ourselves a new trend of old metal. I have seen this everywhere from furniture showrooms to accents in apparel. My favorite would be chunky stacks of these bracelets incorporated with a few wraps with beads and neon pops. Or a big statement piece necklace like below. I was lucky enough to get an even closer look at how this trend is achieved, we can't just wait around for copper to age itself!
$75.00 buy here
Yesterday I got the chance to view my first Etsy seller workshop. It was the most amazing experience. Whenever I peruse Etsy I think, "If they can make that so can I" which usually leads to many at home projects that I never finish and enviably makes me feel like these people really are experts at what they do. Being in the Beadz and Bloomz studio yesterday proved just that. Heather the owner of Beadz and Bloomz is an expert at taking nothing and making it into something amazing. Heather has been hand making jewelry for 20 years, originally doing beading work and recently venturing into metal work, more specifically copper as its more affordable. Her motto is that she wants to keep her pieces affordable for the everyday consumer. Which of-course is why I loved her stuff, that and unique is always a trend in my book!
$17.50 buy here
Her inspiration has come from years of being in the floral industry. To make enough money to support her family and pursue her love of jewelry design, she has managed flower shops as well as freelance for an event coordinator. In every piece you can see the nature infused country girl she is at heart.
$75.00 buy here
Heather grew up in an extremely small town in the Paso Robles California area, graduating in a class of 5 she knew there was more than just wine country in-store for her. After leaving the small town to see what the rest of the world had to offer her she took to Charleston South Carolina and then later Michigan, all following her dream to take the best care of her family and design flowers for the taking. While struggling to make it in the bad economy of Kalamazoo, Michigan she decided it was best for her husband and their two little girls to head to LA. It would be the promise land for them to have the best of both worlds. Now residing in the adorable town of Old Town Monrovia. She has a property that allows her to have a workshop in the back of her house that looks at the San Gabriel mountains and in the middle of multiple parks for her children to expand their imaginations. Which after meeting the youngest daughter at age 4 is the most imaginative little girl I have ever met. You could see that not only is Heather beyond creative, her offspring have this same gift.
Beedz and Bloomz Shop
When I arrived, Heather was working on silver stack rings. In the middle you can see the odd shape of the rings. She explained that fussed rings, all start like this. They essentially start in a straight form and she bends them to fuse. To achieve the shape she puts them on the sizer in the right picture where she stretches and bangs it with her fancy tools to create effects and gets the size she desires.
$50.00 buy here
This is a snippet of how she achieves the cooper aged look. The original raw goods is in the first photo. After she stamps the piece she has cut to work on she will process the stamping and the outer areas that were not stamped almost like photo processing. These chemicals are fairly mild and easy to work with, though if left in the process to long, it will eat away the entire piece leaving what looked like a web. Pretty cool when you are creative like Heather, she has a little something in mind to use this feature.
$30.00 buy here
I really suggest buying from a professional in this case. And please appreciate the craft-mans ship that goes into these pieces, there is a lot of love and hard work that goes into this.
For more amazing pieces from Beadz and Bloomz please visit
http://www.etsy.com/shop/bbluxe
or
http://www.etsy.com/shop/beadifulbaublessc
xo,
L
