More colorful anodized aluminum earrings!

I'm still on my anodized aluminum kick and made two more pairs of earrings this afternoon. One features different sized triangles in blue, turquoise and silver; the other pair consists on rectangles in silver, purple and lavender:

Sometimes very simple designs are the most eye-catching and I feel like tht's the case with these handmade earrings. They're so colorful and the bold shapes lets the different shades of metal stand out.

These also look as if they're easy to make, but they're really not. It takes time to cut and drill each shape and then file the ends to blunt them and get them even. The designs are minimalist, but are still pretty labor intensive.

I have an idea for something even more abstract that I plan to work on tomorrow, so stay tuned! Meantime, check out my jewellery at Naomi's Designs and MayaGirl Creations.

Mixed metal jewelry designs

After having such a good experience at the craft fair this weekend, I decided to go ahead and finish the jewelry projects that I'd started in class. I could wait until I begin advanced metalsmithing tomorrow and work on my pieces at the school, but I'd rather put them behind me and work on something new. Besides, I'm happy with the way my stuff turned out. My last teacher would probably say that they're not shiny enough and would criticize me for not soldering the jumprings, but I think they're pretty and would proudly wear them.

I made an abstract copper pendant with a silver bezel and blue glass cabochon:

And then made a pair of abstract copper earrings with silver earring hooks:

The earrings are actually made of material that was leftover from the pendant. I spent over an hour hammering a sheet of copper to get that textured design and had a lot left over after sawing out the disc. I didn't want the rest to go to waste and had just enough to make a cute pair of earrings.

Carving out the designs with a jeweler's saw was a challenge, but I'm getting the hang out it. The hardest part, believe it or not, was sawing out the circle for the pendant. I was so careful with it because I wanted to keep it round and not accidentally saw into the space, so it took me forever to finish it.

I'm happy with my work, though. I may not be the best metalsmith -- yet -- but I like how my stuff came out. And really, that's all I can ask for, right?

To purchase my jewelry, head to Naomi's Designs.

Silver geometric earrings with blue Swarovski crystals

I made these earrings while my friend Lani was visiting. I asked her what I should make and she suggested that I make something that had crystals in it. So after playing around with 16 gauge sterling silver wire, I came up with this random, but cool design. I then strung different color blue Swarovski crystals across it using 28 gauge silver wire.

I tend to use a lot of blue beads and crystals because that's my favorite color. I especially love when different shades of blue are combined. For me, blue is very relaxing; it reminds me of the sky or the ocean on a bright, sunny day. It's also a color that I look nice in so I own a lot of blue clothing. Not surprisingly my high school crush had piercing blue eyes!

Anyway, silver is a great color to contrast with blue as you can see with these earrings. The earrings are not exactly identical, but I think that this only adds to their uniqueness.

For more of my jewelry, head to Naomi's Designs.