Too hot to Blog!

It's been a while yes I know.
Since the last post I'd delivered 3 packages with lots of goodies for 3 different galleries, two in Belgium and one in Toulon, South of France. Not to mention jetting off in between to Milos, Greece with my yoga buddies for some much needed time-out.

Below are just a few pieces from the week! Mixing Oxidised Silver with gold and Silver & gold-plated etc.

Take care under this intense heat x

From one tool to another and wearable to boot

A while back, I was given a pair of solid Mother of Pearl(MOP) Salad servers by a lovely client. They were both broken in parts that enabled further use from its original purpose. Being familiar with my previous MOP line she gave me permission to repurpose these magnificently thick MOP parts into jewellery. Between a long period of pondering in & out of what justice I could do with them and my recent visit to an exhibition at Galerie La Joaillerie pa Mazlo call 'Holy Tools' a light-bulb went off! I cannot tell you how thrilled I am for these to be finally reunited with their initial objective as tools AND be given an additional new life as art jewellery.

Two have been made thus far, one as a comb and the other a paper knife. The further left chunky piece is yet to be transformed.

Here are some in between pictures below or just simply follow my Instagram for regular updates. https://www.instagram.com/minicyn_/

Nuit étoilée Lapis Lazuli silver necklaces

I fell in love with these lozenge-like flat Lapis Lazuli cabochons and bought a few to try out last year. It seems interesting to set them as I usually would with my round Moonstone cabochons into ball-like pendants for one of them and the other in its "logical" extended cylindrical self.

Lapis Lazuli is a semi-precious stone that has been prized since antiquity for its intense colour for many ancient cultures. I'd remembered being told at design school that it was not available in Europe until the end of the Middle Ages, where it was ground into powder and made into Ultramarine – the finest and most expensive of all blue pigments for paints! It was used by some of the most important artists of the Renaissance & Baroque often reserved for colouring in the clothing of the central figures of their paintings, especially the Virgin Mary. Let's keep an eye out next time we see her!

Pyrite (metallic yellow) is a mineral often found sprinkled throughout the blue (sodalite). Thus creating a Nuit étoilée / Starry Night indeed.

Here are the 2 necklaces I've made.