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Wednesday, January 14, 2009

Found Elements Used in Design


This vintage jet black found cameo style piece is just waiting
for me to use it in a design. Note the gorgeous vintage grey
square mother of pearl button in the lower corner. Beauty!


A great shot of various vintage white mother of pearl buttons
that are waiting to be designed with. I look high and low to find
great elements to design my jewelry out of.


There are a lot of different great vintage elements to design with in
this photo. Note the vintage gold filled locket with filigree on the
bottom right corner. The cameo hand carved mother of pearl girl
pendant in the lower left is another great piece. Hearts seem to be
filling up this photo, but they are truly a romantic sign of the times
with vintage elements and thus quite often found in my pursuit of
great finds.

Vintage keys are always a great addition to vintage styled
designs. The gold leaf elment is cool, as are the various white
vintage mother of pearl carved buttons, and the awesome very
large mother of pearl belt buckle piece up on the top left.


The top right rose gold bird will become a cool element in a
vintage redesign necklace piece, as will the great glass clear
vintage buttons and various other elements shown here.


The top left cameo piece is a finished pendant for a necklace
that is currently SOLD. It started as a combination of found
elements and is now a great one-of-a-kind piece of jewelry.

Note that the found element that takes up most of the space in
this photo is a vintage door pull. These are great design elements.
Bottom right piece started out as a vintage mother of pearl grey
button and vintage 1950's clip on earring. A lovely combination.
I just wanted to share with you some of the treasures I look for
when I am out foraging. I may find great pieces at an antique shop
nearby or while in Illinois for a family wedding. I keep an eye out
for little treasures while shopping thrift stores, garage sales, flea
markets, occasional sales, and whatever resources I happen to come
upon that may have great smalls such as these.
I have been a collector of smalls since I can first remember even back
to as early of an age as eight years old. I guess I was destined to do
this creative type of work for many years.

4 comments:

  1. Hi Gretchen,
    I'm so glad you're blogging. These pieces individually are beautiful but I must say your photo taking is gorgeous as well. I can't wait to see what types of jewelry will come from these.
    Take care.

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  2. These photos are wonderful. I just noticed your blog on Garden Antiqs Vintage, and will keep watching!

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  3. Hi Gretchen! Thanks for stopping by my blog and leaving a comment. I truly enjoyed reading through your blog as well...actually, it seems you and I have a lot in common! I would LOVE to learn how to make jewelry with found objects. I think I could probably teach myself, but I guess I'm a little intimidated! I was so happy with how the scrabble letter necklaces turned out. I have a pretty decent size collection of vintage bits and baubles that I would love to turn into jewelry someday. Too bad we're not both in the same place - we could get together and make some fun stuff!!!

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  4. I think I want to come over to your house & play!

    I will bring the treats.....

    ReplyDelete

I am so thankful you took the time to let me know what you think about what I write and for taking the time to share your thoughts. Thanks for stopping by and visiting my blog. :)

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