Done and Done

For the past year, I've been working on a couple of brooch bridal bouquets for my Etsy shop. Actually, at the start  I intended to do a single mixed metal bouquet, but that didn't float my boat so I separated it into two. That meant I had to search longer for pieces than I thought I would, but who doesn't love searching?

Here's the gold one as I was working on it. (I removed all the masking tape before I finished, but it's a handy way to hold things for a while.)

Here it is completed. Do you love it or am I just blinded by my own shining self?

I even added a decoration to the bottom of the handle.

Cool, innit?

To make the bouquet, I followed a number of tutorials I found on the 'net but they only took me so far. From there, I improvised. I'm quite pleased with how it turned out, but think I'll take a break before working on the silver. (Finding silver tone pieces has been much more difficult than finding gold tone, perhaps because with the silver I want rhinestones. As a result, I've got a lot more money invested in the silver than in the gold.)

This is me, dusting my hands in satisfaction!

Tassels Heard from Again

It's been awhile since I worked on tassels, but I recently had a request for a couple. I thought I'd use this blog to present ones I've already done. So here goes....

This is more formal, sort of elegant. I used bits of sample fringes to make it, bits I no longer have. It's not in the colorway the client wants, nor are any of the others I show here, but hopefully they'll give an indication of what I can do.

Only in the past few years have I been adding ruffs to tassels. I like the look of them, but they detract from the heads, which I consider the most creative part.

On this one, the ruff I added was more sparse so it doesn't completely obscure the head.

I like the ribbon yarn I used on this one, not that crazy about the ruff. If I try that technique again, I'll have to tweak it. (The yarn's in shades of blue and green. In this one, I emphasized the green more than the blue.)

This is probably my fave yarn. It's strips of silk cut from saris and sewn together. The colors are random but I like how they work together.

The tassel the customer referenced was made before I started adding ruffs. See how much more striking the head is without the ruff?