Winter Enchantment

While working on my Song of Songs collection for December, I managed to make couple of new pieces. This is the story of the Artbeads.com-sponsored Winter Enchantment challenge for bloggers.

For me, winter means snow and ice. I spent couple of winters at grandma's in Russia (up to -40°C). This piece is inspired by those winters. And here is the link to visualize my inspiration.
At the same time, I was thinking of Hans Christian Andersen's saga about the Snow Queen. Guess, if ever got married, she'd wear something like this.


The idea of the necklace was simple: to make a choker with almost invisible netted strap, with an ice-flower in the middle and a cascade of frosty branches hanging from it.


Every long branch ends with a rod of natural ice-clear quartz, and every branchlet ends with Swarovski - crystal or pearl. The focal is Swarovski fancy oval 4127. I think I start to develop addiction to this particular type of bead. It is very easy to bezel and it gives amazing effect to the finished piece. The cut of the crystal is perfect. After working just with these large Swarovski elements, I've learned to easily tell them apart from "Chinarovski" and other imitations of Austrian crystal.


I blended severl types of seed beads in it, both Japanese and Czech. Miyuki Delica and Toho as well as most of the Swarovski beads have been supplied by the Artbeads.com.


Thank You goes not just to Artbeads.com, but also to my sister in law, Karin, who has generously allowed to use her as a model ;)

You know, perhaps, how much pain in the back it is to take pictures of completely white beaded jewelry. With another words, it is close to the mission impossible. However, at daylight and under strong sun it turnes out quite Ok.

Disclamer: part of the materials used in this project have been supplied by Artbeads.com free of charge.