Love is a many splendoured thing

Loves of the month...

• MANIAMANIA

http://www.themaniamania.com/

When it comes to jewellery, I'm a sucker for anything big and chunky, and the kids from ManiaMania give me my fix with their colossal sized bangles and cuffs and embellished statement neckpieces. Their perfect union of raw crystals, gold and silver demonstrates that with large and simple in mind, amazing things happen, and their oversized and almost armour like pieces have a sort of native feel, which I absolutely love!

• Love a bit of Dinosaur Designs...
  
  

http://www.dinosaurdesigns.com.au/

From various ranges, their stuff is always bright and funky! Also a good source of inspiration for a bit of resin work.

• Sandra Backlund

http://www.sandrabacklund.com/

This woman's work is nothing short of amazing! Although she works in the field of fashion especially in the form of contemporary knitwear, her garments present unbelieveable structures and patterns unlike anything I have seen before as well as unusual layering and weaving techniques; ideas which can be adopted into the jewellery making process!

These are all commercial designers or brands which always give me a bit of a kick when I'm short on ideas, as well as these, there are also so many beautiful works and art jewellery by both local Australian and renowned international artists out there...

check them out at www.galleryfunaki.com.au, www.egetal.com.au, www.studioingot.com.au and www.glitzern.com.au.

Let's get some shoes...

Shoes... they go on your feet, right? Wrong!

Our task of the week this week was to mess around with an old (and preferably unloved) shoe until it's days as a shoe were done and dusted! We ripped, teared, sawed and hacked till our little heart's content, and until we no longer left with whole shoes, but random components of which to contruct something completely new and very un-shoelike.

Here's a quick peek at the old leather golf shoe I picked up - pre-violent operation!

So what now?
It's deconstruction time!
Those spikes on the bottom look naaaaasty, going to have a hard time attempting to pull those guys out...

I'll continue to post photos of the work in progress as I go along :)