The Perfect Storm for Costume Jewelers and The Craft Industry Starry, Starry Night mixed media necklace copyright 2008 Margot Potter (click on image to see close up)

This is a necklace I've been working on to wear to CHA and to share in my Paper Crafting Jewelry demos for Beadalon. I'm so digging this! When Stefano Pilati came out with his FABULOUS acrylic star choker for YSL, which I've blathered on about here before, I was absolutely knocked out. I'm a gal who loves oversized jewelry, which is funny because I'm rather diminuitive, but I have a big personality and I like jewelry to match. It's either tiny and understated or totally over the top in my world. I don't have three grand lying around to buy an Haute Couture plastic necklace and if I did, I'd pay a bill, but I wanted something with huge stars on it galdangy and I was determined. So using the Pilati necklace as my inspiration, I found some huge (4") chipboard stars and proceeded to stamp, paint, stamp and seal them. I had more stars initially, but this hangs more comfortably around the neck, I always try to combine form and function in my designs. I made two versions, the first was reversible and had two different color palettes, but that didn't work out since the stars flip as you wear it. So I went back to the drawing board. The two sides of the stars are slightly different because they are two different surfaces. I had to make them coordinate without being exactly the same. So I ended up with this, which I love. It features inked chipboard stars, Beadalon black polyester fabric chain (which seriously ROCKS btw), vintage German glass teardrops and huge acrylic faceted beads from Red Bank Bead Company and it's all sealed in an acrylic glaze so it's super sturdy. (Not swimming pool sturdy mind you, but day to day sturdy!) The square jump rings at the back of the design are from the new Plaid Connect line and the rectangle jump rings and swivel lobster clasps on the stars are a Beadalon product (round jump rings wouldn't have worked as well.) You can therefore easily remove the stars to put them on something else or to make the necklace less or more starry depending on your mood. I like versatility!

I have a few really excellent coffee table books on costume jewelry that I am constantly rummaging through for inspiration. I'm a huge fan of costume jewelry because it requires designers to really stretch themselves. Back in the 1930s and 1940s during the Great Depression and WWII costume jewelry gained a huge share of the jewelry market. Costume jewelers could go places fine jewelers simply could not because of cost of materials. So when women didn't have a lot of money then and throughout history, they turned to costume jewelry. Now that's not to say I'm not a fan of fine jewelry, I simply can't afford to buy it. Making a perfectly cut gemstone set in precious metal look good is an indisputed art, but take some paper and ink and a few plastic gee gaws and make them beautiful, now that is to me, incredibly interesting and artful. I think the recent interest in repurposing and recycling and the downturn of the economy are creating the perfect storm for costume and mixed media jewelry artists. A lot of folks turn their noses up at plastic or paper or wood or trash as jewelry mediums, but to me that's just silly. If you can take the most basic of materials and make them shine, you've got talent.

I'm not going to race around like Chicken Little here and yell that the sky is falling on the jewelry and craft industries. There is no better time for us, really. Women will never, ever stop wanting to be pretty, so show them how to do it on a budget. Show them how to take last year's dress and make it fabulous. If we can't afford to buy greeting cards or home décor items, show us how to make our own using new and recycled materials. Give the women who don't wish to create their own, ready made affordable and innovative items and accessories. As for the gals who do but think they can't, well, they just need to be shown how.

The craft industry needs to wake up and smell the opportunity. Make it fast, easy, fun and rewarding, show folks how to take the things they already have and make them new, keep them laughing so they don't feel intimidated, recognize that there is a wide demographic that isn't just the Indie crowd and the older woman and cater to us all and make the projects/techniques/concepts stylish and chic. I can't tell you how many kits or how to projects I see with finished designs that are so godawful I wonder, didn't the manufacturer think about what women actually wear?! I have to ask myself on a daily basis when I'm designing, can I picture someone wearing that? If I saw that in a catalog would I think, "Wow!" or "Damn, that is fug-ly."?

To me, being able to DIY, means you can shine like a superstar no matter how much money you have in your bank account. That's the point, isn't it?

xoxo
Margot