Earthenwood Design Team -- Time's Dead Flowers

I'm honored to have been chosen to be a member of the Earthenwood Design Team for the month of February (yes, I know it's March now, I fell behind). Melanie sent me a great assortment of new components to design with. I used half of them to create this piece, which I call Time's Dead Flowers, inspired by a line in a Faith and the Muse song. Be sure to click on the link so you can see what the other Design Team members have done so far. It looks like everyone got the same elements but in different glaze combinations, which gives the designs great variety -- but of course, mine is the only one that is green ;)

This was very much a design-as-I-go sort of piece. I knew that I wanted to use the Clock Face Link and the pair of pewtery links to design a steampunk necklace to wear to Wild Wild West Con this weekend. I also knew that I wanted to use the bits of leftover chain that had been floating around on my desk for a couple of months. Other than that, I wasn't sure if I wanted to put in some bead weaving, or some strung elements, or what. I went into the beadroom to find what I could find.

One thing that I love about working with Melanie's components is that they're easy to work into any sort of beading. The wire loops are especially versatile; they can be linked onto a chain, hung from a strand, crimped through, or woven through. The punched holes in the pewtery links were a little more challenging -- My jump rings were a tight fit, which meant that I ended up substituting ribbon for chain.
The ribbon was wound around a card, so it looks funny in this picture, but the weight of the necklace pulls it straight when it's being worn. I originally had it hanging from a brown ribbon, and it looked nice, but then I said to myself "Wow, this necklace is really brown, and I'm a proponent of color in steampunk... I should add some green." So I grabbed the green ribbon, wove it through the chain and links, and added some green dangles, with vintage flower beads to echo the floral theme of the brass stamping.
Closeup! I decided that this was a perfect opportunity to use some of the new TierraCast brass oxide Metamorphosis components that I picked up during the gem show. The clock drop was a natural companion for the clock face link!
Another close-up! See what I mean about how easy these links are to work with? I simply used jumprings to attach the link to the brass flower. The entire necklace came together in minutes, if you don't count all the time I spent redesigning it and changing things and looking for things.

Melanie also sent these two red components with lovely heart themes. I have plans for them, plans involving beadweaving, red satin 3-cut seed beads, a black enameled key... It's going to be luscious! And another steampunk design with color!

If you'd like some Earthenwood components to use in your own designs, you should visit Melanie's website or Etsy shop. If you'd like to see more of my jewelry using Earthenwood components, you should visit my shop, Handmade Jewelry by Erthe Fae Designs.

Disclaimer: FTC regulations say that this post isn't long enough yet and I need to make it abundantly clear that I received some of these items for free in return for promotional consideration on my blog. Consider yourself disclaimed.