Lynda's "Vintage Ephemera" Bead All Grown Up

Well, I was pretty eager to get cracking on creating a necklace for the fabulous "vintage ephemera" bead Lynda Moseley of Diva Designs sent me. (Please see my previous post for more details on her stunning polymer clay beads and focals). I had the design in my head already, mostly, and it was just a matter of playing with it a little. I knew I wanted to use a bunch of the wonderful antique-silver-plated chain I just got from Lima Beads the other day, and red agate and labradorite, and probably some pearls. This is how that all eventually shook out:

I decided to add a couple of my nickel beadcaps to the focal, as the holes were fairly large and I wanted the bail to be really sturdy on it. I balled one end of a long piece of 20 gauge sterling silver wire in my torch, hammered it a bit, and strung a bunch of 3mm beads on it inside the focal, to tighten up the fit inside because I didn't want it wobbling. Then I had to stick down the beadcaps with some Hypocement, to keep them from moving around. Then I just started wrapping all my stones. The Dremel came in handy when it was time to polish!

I made it fairly long--the longer strand is 26"--because I felt the focal needed a dramatic sweep of stones and chain. You can see the length better here:

The chains featured here from Lima are the double cable chain (silver plated steel), flat oval chain (also silver plated steel), and a delicate ladder chain (silver plated brass). The have a great feel to them. The ladder chain is actually the same chain I make myself, just with a much rounder, hammered loop, and much finer. I'm going to make some of this in a larger gauge! I love the rounded, hammered portion.

Lynda, I hope you're pleased with how your "baby" has grown up. It made it all come together so easily--it really is a joy to design around a beautiful art bead. Thanks again, Lynda!

I Dub Thee, Lynda, the Queen of Fauxtiquities

I was cruising around on Flickr, and discovered an artist who makes the most astounding beads and focals from polymer clay--looks like she robbed an archeological site of its most luminous treasures! Everybody, meet Lynda of Diva Designs.

I just fell in love with her focals in particular, and found myself often oohing and aahing over her things on Flickr.  In a fit of wonderment over the pendant focal below, I fervently declared her the Queen of Fauxtiquities:

Look at the HIEROGLYPHICS on there!!!  I adore hieroglyphics.

She was so thrilled with this moniker (which I confess I didn't think up myself--rather I had heard it elsewhere and appropriately appended it to her) that she offered me one of her beads as a thank you!! Well I just about DIED.  Of course I wanted the dragonfly one above but it was sold.  DAMMIT.  So I went "shopping" on her Flickr site.  Well, in addition to the stamped/embossed styles above, she has a whole line of image transfer beads and focals.  I decided to go with something that would force me to design something I wouldn't normally do.  I chose the one below:

It also has a spot of lovely brick red on it (it's on the right in this photo, pictured with one of its fellows):

I got it the other day in the mail from Lynda and have been fondling it regularly ever since.  Mine mine MINE!!! Love the silver eyelet detail at either end.  I have a design in my mind for it and hope to get to it this weekend.

There is so much fabulousness in her Flickr stream, I can't fit it all here. But I'm sure as heck going to try. Look at this:

And this:

And this:

And this!

I could go on and on:

And on:

Phew! And there's lots more!!! But I'll stop now before I become slavishly fawning, or before I reach my Blogger photo limit.

I highly encourage you to check out Lynda's Flickr photostream, stop by her blog, and visit her Etsy shop. Her designs are a feast for the eyes! She even has tutorials for sale in her Etsy shop on how to create your own image transfer components with polymer clay.

Have fun!!