Monday 25 July 2011

Peacock Set

I've had this peacock feather (bought when I was a kid) lying around, and it's always getting lost.  So I thought, why not make something out of it that won't be so easily lost, so I made this for myself.
 
First I cut the feather as close to the plumage as I could, but I didn't throw the other bit away.  I'll show you what I did with that later.  I wrapped copper wire around the top and around a copper jump ring several times for security. 
 
I used the many different coloured semi-precious stones I had to emulate the graduating colours of the feather itself.  I started with Goldstone flecked Bluestone chips on either side of the feather pendant.
I didn't have any purple beads that matched the shade I wanted, so I went for turquoise instead.  This is "S" shaped Blue (dyed) Lemon Turquoise.

 I then threaded different sized Antique Bronze metal beads onto pins and bent them into a marquise shape and hung these pear shaped - Turquoise (dyed) Picasso Jasper beads from them.
 There's two thin lines of brown either side of a bright green before it fades into the beautiful dark green colour on the feather.  So to emulate this, I got to use my new brown acrylic beads and lime silver lined seed beads.
 Finally I ended with one of my favourite semi-precious stones - Malachite.
 And it's all connected with an antique bronze barrel clasp.
 So what did I do with the rest of the feather?  I stripped it and made earrings!
 A couple more malachite chips and Capri blue beads for distinction...
 
and voila! Peacock earrings.
 
I have no idea what the price is as I was just having fun.  I can't replicate this design at all, it's just something I made for myself.  I do plan to do more work with feathers though, so keep checking back!

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