Black, gold and green - and a little softness too

When I posted a picture of this bracelet, one of my good friends (Claire) said 'super colour combo - one of those unexpected ones that you do so well' which was of course, an enormous compliment coming from someone who kind of knows what she's doing with colour and components herself, ahem! I almost feel like I'm cheating when I accept compliments like that though - I'm so led by what's in front of me. This bracelet was actually a reworking of one from a couple of years ago (not sure I ever took a photo of the original, sorry) which for some reason I made for an approximately 12" wrist (not quite, but you get the picture!) and had needed re-doing for some time. It was sitting on my work tray, along with a new set of astonishing lampwork beads from Jana Filípková (I must show you the rest of the set sometime soon - really and truly, astounding), and somehow the fun spottiness of the vintage black acrylic, and the playful shimmering sparkliness of Jana's glitter ball seemed like they wanted to go together. It also helped to balance the bracelet nicely too - those large acrylic beads are actually very light, and the smoky frosted sea-glass-esque rounds on the other side are on the heavy side by comparison. The large glitter ball did the trick, weight-wise. (And psst - there's another butterfly on this bracelet too...!)

I had some of the acrylic rounds left over from shortening my canklet-style bracelet, and so decided to turn them into some simple earrings. I don't often work with black - I'm not entirely sure why, I do wear black both in my clothes and make-up, but somehow I really don't like it in home decor or beads. Too harsh; too stark. I knew these beads needed softening for them to work for me, but as these rounds are on the large side, I felt that adding beads onto them wasn't the thing to do here, despite this post. I tried flattening out a couple of etched brass bead caps but they didn't look right, and then I remembered Lorelei Eurto's vintage tin bead caps that I splurged on a while back. Still have a small cache of them left over, pleasingly! These lovely floral ones - pinks, peaches, greens and cornflower blooms on a yellow base - gave the black acrylic just the right feel, and tapped into their vintage feel. I also had exactly the right weenie lampwork beads from Julie Wong Sontag in a soft, etched lemon yellow, to decorate the earwires. 

Both of these sold the same day I shared them, so perhaps I should work with black more often....!