Silver wire wrapped glass pendants with Swarovski crystals; introducing the Crystal Collection!

As my upcoming vendor sales get close, I've been working round the clock on new pieces. There have been a few failures: for instance, I had a glass piece literally explode on me the other day. When I opened my kiln, the glass shot across the microwave. This is why I wear protective gloves and glasses! Thankfully, the pieces didn't hit me and I wasn't hurt.

Meantime, I've been working on a new bracelet in enameling. This link was supposed to have one blue side and one white side; I then planned to add cloisonne wire to the white side so I could wet-pack it with color. However, something went incredibly wrong along the way and the enamel did this:

I don't know what the hell happened here, but it looks like a wave. Actually, from one angle, it looks like a wave and from another, it looks like a dolphin is jumping from the water. It's so bizarre... but as far as mistakes go, kind of cool. My teacher thinks I added too much enamel to the blue side, but my classmates were very amused and persuaded me to keep it. I call it the "Wacky Wave."

In between these disasters, I HAVE made some decent pieces. I'm particularly happy with a series of glass pendants I designed, which I've named my Crystal Collection:

I made these by fusing clear textured glass onto a white base. It's no secret that I love color, so most of my dichroic glass pieces have been made by fusing bright-colored material onto a clear or black base. I'd been ignoring these clear pieces because they didn't catch my eye right away, and I was more drawn to the sparkly blues and yellows, etc.

However, I took a closer look at the clears and realized that they're actually quite beautiful. The designs are subtle, but colorful when the light hits.

I didn't think they'd show up well on a clear base and figured they'd blend right into black glass. I then fused them against the white... and voila! Here are these beautiful pieces that look like lace or crystal.

I still thought they needed a little something more, though, so I wrapped them with silver wire and Swarovski crystal bicones. I chose bicones that accentuate each glass' undercolors. The one with blue crystals has a blue tint when you turn it toward the light. I call this pendant "Glacial Greatness." The pink one is "Ice Queen" and the large pendant is "All That Glitters."

When wire wrapping these pieces, I try to do it so that the wire doesn't completely cover and obscure the pendant. In this case, I wanted the wire to have a "natural" look, so I bent it into a jagged design. It reminds me of tree branches or a winding river, and the curves bring out the textures in the glass.

My table at the fair is going to be covered with eye-catching, multicolor pieces... but I hope people notice these crystal pendants, too. I'm just sorry that it took me so long to recognize the beauty in working with clear and white glass.

Check out the rest of my handmade wire wrapped, glass and enamel jewellery at Naomi's Designs and MayaGirl Creations.

Photo gallery: Wire wrapped winter wonderland jewelry

Brrrr! Don't know how the weather is where you live, but it's in the TEENS in New York City and is dropping into single digits at night. Even worse, it's supposed to snow tomorrow. Yikes!

Happily I'm warm and dry at home and am trying to find some positives in the ridiculously cold weather. For one thing, new snow is always really pretty; also, my birthday is in a few days. So there you go -- a couple of good things about winter!

In honor of this cold front, here's a photo gallery featuring some of my "icy" designs; all of these pieces are made with clear Swarovski or Celestial crystals. To purchase my jewelry, head to Naomi's Designs or MayaGirl Creations. Stay warm and enjoy!

Silver wire wrapped teardrop bridal necklace with Swarovski crystals

Silver wire wrapped bangle bracelet with Celestial crystals

Silver wire wrapped birthstone infinity ring for April with clear Swarovski crystal "diamonds"

Wire wrapped giant Swarovski prism crystal

Wire wrapped abstract pendant with square Celestial crystals

Silver square earrings wire wrapped with square Swarovski crystals

Silver wire wrapped infinity symbol birthstone bracelet

One of my New Year's resolutions was to build up my MayaGirl Creations shop. I'm pleased to say that so far, it's working out! This morning I received an interesting order from a customer; she said that she liked my line of infinity rings and asked if I could design an infinity symbol bracelet for a four-year-old.

We e-mailed back and forth and I suggested that I make a delicate wire wrapped bracelet with a large silver infinity charm as the centerpiece, pink crystals and an adjustable chain. This way, the little girl can grow into this bracelet from her mom and wear it for a few years. I used pink Swarovski bicones because they're tiny and will work well on a small wrist. I curved the end of the clasp so that there would be no edges that could dig into her arm. This is what I came up with:

Since my infinity birthstone rings have sold so well, I'm planning to offer this bracelet with birthstones, too. I can also do it in rainbow colors or with alternating colors, like green and pink or blue and purple. In other words, there are about a million variations I can make with this simple design.

So thank you to this customer for putting this idea in my head. It was a good one!

To purchase my jewellery, head to Naomi's Designs. To purchase my children's jewelry, head to MayaGirl Creations. To purchase my novel, check out REVENGE OF A BAND GEEK GONE BAD.

Silver wire wrapped rings with Swarovski crystals

I haven't made that many things in the last couple of weeks (that's the beauty of taking classes; they guarantee that you will make new products!), but am now starting a new fall collection of silver wire wrapped rings with Swarovski crystals. These rings are very similar to my copper art rings with crystals, only I'm using 20 gauge silver plated wire.

For the ring pictured on top, I used blue, black and turquoise Swarovski crystals. I twisted the wire into a spiral-like design and it ended up looking like a vortex. I think it's cool how it's almost three-dimensional and has a lot of texture to the design.

When making the ring with the amethyst crystals, I was inspired a little by this summer's Olympic games. It's modeled a bit after the crown that is placed on the heads of winning athletes, only for this, the "crown" is made of purple stones. What I like about this ring is that the design goes almost all the way around the ring, so its appearance changes slightly if you turn the ring.

I have plenty of other ideas for silver art rings, so more will be on the way! Meantime, I'm enjoying the cooler fall weather, which makes it so much more pleasant to work.

To purchase my jewellery, head to Naomi's Designs. To purchase my children's jewelry, head to MayaGirl Creations.

Copper wire wrapped wave rings with Swarovski crystals

As part of my plan to get my jewellery into stores, I need to create professional looking line sheets. This is basically a catalogue of your work that contains photos and wholesale prices so that stores know what they can order from you. In looking at others' line sheets, however, I've seen that most jewelry artists actually have lines or collections, such as the "Jungle Collection 2012" or "Floral Fantasies," etc.

I've decided to create some actual collections of my own. Many of my pieces are a little random and one of a kind, but I need to think in terms of what would work for a store -- in other words, what looks pretty, can be mass produced, isn't too expensive to make and is trendy? My Infinity rings are an obvious collection, as are my wire wrapped filigree chandelier earrings. I've been experimenting with other wire wrapped ring designs lately and have come up with my latest collection: the wire wrapped wave ring.

This ring is similar to those wire wrapped art rings that I previewed the other day, only the design is a lot less random and more controlled. There's a definite pattern to it. I call it a wave ring because, well, the way the spiral turns looks like a wave to me. So far, I've made variations in three color combinations:

Romance: pink and fuchsia Swarovski crystals:

Ice: blue and light blue crystals:

Citrus: orange and yellow crystals:

These can be made in any size and I think are very funky looking and fun! I'll update as I make more variations. To purchase my jewelry, head to Naomi's Designs. To purchase my children's jewellery, head to MayaGirl Creations.

Silver wire wrapped infinity ring with rainbow Swarovski crystals

Part of running a good business, I'm learning, is to provide the customers with what they want. My customers seem to love infinity rings. I've sold dozens and they're really popular with teen girls.

That said, I'm trying to expand my repertoire and do some variations on them. This way, I can satisfy the customers, run a business that actually makes money and satisfy my own desires to be creative and keep making new items. Everybody wins!

This afternoon, I designed a colorful version of my classic silver infinity ring. This is a silver infinity symbol ring that's been wire wrapped with rainbow Swarovski crystals.

I'd initially tried wire wrapping the ring with larger crystals, but felt that it compromised the integrity of the infinity symbol design. But these crystals are so small that they don't get in the way. They add to the design rather than obscure it. It's also still comfortable to wear, which I believe is really important when it comes to jewelry.

We'll see how this infinity ring does on the market. Meantime, I had fun creating a new twist on a classic piece.

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

Wire wrapped copper chandelier triangle earrings with blue Swarovski crystals

As I said in a previous post, I've been trying to design more challenging pieces of jewelry. This weekend I finished these wire wrapped copper triangle earrings.

These earrings weren't technically hard to make, but were very labor intensive. Altogether, I had to make 42 little triangles -- 21 on each earring -- so that took a few days to complete. I think they look really cool, though, almost like a waterfall. My original plan was to weave the blue Swarovski crystals throughout, but I think that would have been overkill. I like how they turned out with just the little pop of blue at the top of the triangle cascade.

These chandelier earrings are pretty long at about 3 1/2 inches, but are surprisingly light-weight. I test drove them today while I was cleaning and almost forgot I had them on.

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

Silver Bridal Teardrop Necklace With Swarovski Crystals

I love weddings and have been fortunate enough to have had several this year. It's funny because I'm 37 and most of our friends are married so I wasn't expecting to have so many at once. But it seems like all of our remaining single friends decided to wed at the same time. I'm all for parties and happy occasions so I've had fun celebrating with them.

A big part of weddings, of course, is the bride's jewelry. Attending so many nuptials inspired me to create a wedding series, which I based somewhat on my friends' gowns. The trick with wedding jewelry is that you want it to be gorgeous, but it shouldn't overshadow the dress. It should enhance the gown and fit the style.

I designed this teardop necklace to be worn with either a strapless gown or one with a sweetheart neckline. It hangs above the cleavage line so it's the perfect fit for that type of dress. The design is very simple, but ends up creating a complex line that looks almost like waves or feathers on a peacock.

To make this necklace, I sculpted each teardrop, beginning with the crystal. First, I wire wrapped the Swarovski crystal, then shaped the silver into the teardrop. I added a pendant with three crystals in the center and finished off the chain with larger Swarovski crystals.

The look is classic and elegant -- but a little funky, too! Plus, it's affordable. Perfect for any bride who wants to look her best, but not blow a fortune on wedding bling.

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

Silver and Swarovski crystal wire bangle bracelet

It's hard to go wrong when combining silver and clear Swarovski crystals, but there were some challenges involved in making this bangle bracelet.

For starters I decided to experiment and use a softer wire than what I normally use. Most of the time I work with 14-18 gauge wire and then use softer wires (22-28 gauge) for wrapping purposes. However, I envisioned a bracelet that was very thin and delicate and went with 22 gauge. It held up a lot better than I expected, but I then had to deal with the round Swarovski crystals. Most of my other bracelets contain square or faceted crystals, which are easy to work with; they stay in place and you just shape the wire around them. But the round crystals kept spinning and moving, and wouldn't stay in place. I finally gave up and secured them as much as I could, but still let them have some "spin."

Overall, I like how delicate this bracelet is. It's not too chunky and because it has the crystals woven into it, isn't too thin either. Since it's silver and the crystals are clear, it will match pretty much anything; this is the perfect type of bracelet to wear with a stack of other bangles.

To see or purchase more of my jewelry, head to Naomi's Designs or Naomi's Studio.

Silver spiral earrings with green and yellow Swarovski crystals

The spiral is one of the basic shapes you should know if you're going to be a wire artist, but more than that, it's beautiful to look at. Think of how many things in nature are a spiral: the inside of a shell, a galaxy, a hurricane. I love the infinite nature of it, how you can keep going around and around, but the circle doesn't really end.

I wanted to do something simple with the spiral where this would be the primary shape in the piece of jewelry, so I decided to just go with single spiral earrings. However, I didn't want them to be plain silver, so I added a couple of Swarovski crystals to each. I really love blue, but I went with a variant on it, using green and yellow instead. I like the warm, bright colors and think they add just enough flash to the earrings.

To see or purchase more of my work, head to Naomi's Designs or Naomi's Studio.

Silver wire bracelet with Swarovski crystal hearts

First up, some good news! I received my packet to sign up for what will be my first craft fair this May! I'm very excited about this and hope that it will be a beautiful day outside. While I'm, of course, looking forward to selling my jewelry in person, I'm also anxious to meet new people and see what the other artists are selling. I've always had a lot of respect for the artists who participated in fairs, so now it's kind of surreal knowing that I'm going to be one of them.

As for my jewelry du jour, this Swarovski heart bracelet came together as a result of another bracelet that turned out to be a disaster. I love heart-shaped things so I purchased these Swarovski crystal hearts on sale in bulk. Unfortunately, they're not drilled top-to-bottom or side-to-side as many beads are; instead, they're drilled front-to-back at the very top of the crystal, meaning that it's kind of difficult to string them.

My original plan was to make a silver bangle bracelet and then wire wrap the hearts around the outside of the frame. This didn't work. No matter how tightly I wrapped the wire, the hearts were sticking out at weird angles or slipping off the wire .... the project was completely messed up.

I realized that the best way to showcase the hearts was to just let them dangle from a piece. That said, I created one of my favorite patterns, the nine-loop lattice and strung the hearts along the bottom. The bracelet was looking a little bare, though, so I added some matching Swaorvski crystal bicones to give it more color. In the end, this turned into a really cool-looking, fun bracelet.

I still have dozens of these hearts, so I'm trying to decide what to do with them. A matching earring and necklace set might be next...

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

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.

Wire lattice earrings with blue crystals

One of my favorite patterns to make is the nine-loop lattice design. It's not only fun to twist the loops, but it's a very beautiful and useful pattern. You can link the squares together to form a larger pattern, turn the square sideways to make a diamond, hang gems from the lattice ... the possibilities are endless.

I've always liked the combination of brown and blue so when I got this antiqued-looking brown gunmetal wire, I immediately decided to combine it with ble crystals. I wanted to do something different from just dangling one gemstone so I decided to weave the crystals throughout. I love the way the blue sparkles against the brown. I haven't seen too many earrings like this so I'm proud of the work.

Eventually, I plan to make a matching gunmetal lattice necklace. That'll be way more work, though because I'll have to make the entire chain by hand. It'll be worth it, though, especially if these pieces are worn as a set.

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

Silver spiral pendant with Swarovski crystals

The idea for this pendant came when I decided to try a new technique: wire weaving. I'd seen some pictures of woven wire jewelry and liked the look of it, so I decided to incorporate some of those techniques into my latest design.

I'd made a series of geometric pendants in silver and gold, but wanted to try something a little different. Meanwhile, I had a box of tiny multi-colored Swarovski crystal bicones that I wasn't sure what to do with. The solution? Use both in my new piece. I ended up using 28 gauge silver wire to string dozens of the crystals into a colorful, abstract design.

I'll admit, when it came to this piece I was making up things as I went along, but I love the way it came out. It looks like modern art, maybe a bit like Kandinsky, with all of the random colors. Then again, maybe it just looks like a Christmas decoration. But it's pretty and definitely unique! It took a lot of work to create, but I'm glad I put the time in.

For more on my designs head to www.etsy.com/shop/naomirabinowitz