Saturday, December 15, 2012

Gourd Jewelry

It was such an honor to guest post for Inspiration Cafe !  I love the diversity of their creative posts!  The question "What inspires you?"  is frequently asked at  Inspiration Cafe . 
 
I am inspired by my heritage and the craftsmanship of my Ozark Mountains.  Many of these skills are taught at  Ozark Folkways .  You might enjoy this post about it .


 Have you met my gourd decorating teacher, Linda Ashmore ?  I've written about her before  here !


  Let me show you why she is the teacher!  Here are some of her creations!


She participates in the Silver Dollar City Harvest Festival and also has space at a shop in Eureka Springs.


This group of spectacular gourds are available at  Ozark Folkways  near Winslow, Arkansas.


Today's class focused on jewelry made from gourd scraps and an interesting paint technique.

 
For the paint, Linda layered glops and sputters of paint on parchment paper.  Then she swirled this hodge podge of paint with a broken paint brush, just enough to blur any harsh lines.  The paint is allowed to dry a couple of days.


The dried paint is then peeled from the parchment paper.  It's pliable and can be cut with scissors, similar to wallpaper.  Have you ever seen anything like it?!


Linda also brought a table full of doo dads!  With her expert direction, we went to work!


Classmate Rebecca created this wonderful flower!  She kept her gourd project mostly natural with just a touch of bling.  It looks great against her red sweater!


She plans to wear it as a pin, but the glue was not yet dry!


I was able to finish three pieces. The one on the left incorporates turquoise and copper wire.
 
Gourds have naturally occurring freckles and dimples.  The round piece had an interesting heart shaped blemish in the center, so I painted it purple.  Then noticed a second, smaller heart.  So it was painted, too.  Next, I glued the dried paint wallpaper around the edges to frame the hearts.  That blurring of color is just fascinating to me.
 
 
 For the square piece, I simply layered the dried paint wallpaper for an interesting effect.  Using Loctite, pin clasps were glued to the back of each gourd scrap.
 
How you would style these jewelry pieces?
 
 
 
Spending time with Linda is always a treat!  While this class was not at all what I was expecting, it certainly brought new ideas, which brings new sources of inspiration! 
 
What inspires you?  I'd love to hear all about it!
 
;-)  -Marci

6 comments:

  1. We loved this post when you did it for the Inspiration Cafe and I love it again! So cool!

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  2. O really like those three pieces you made - esp the one with the copper and turquoise! Thanks for sharing your creativity with Visible Monday : >

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  3. I love the turquoise and copper one, I'd make it into a pendant - visiting from Thriving on Thursdays.

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  4. Lovely pieces- I'd never heard about gourd jewellery before.

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  5. Thanks so much for sharing at Wednesday’s Adorned From Above Blog Hop!
    Debi @ adornedfromabove.com
    Angie @ godsgrowinggarden.com
    PS - It's me - Angie - I can't wait for January 2nd when our "Great Blog Train" hop starts!

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  6. wow, they all look so pretty! thanks for sharing!

    Loved seeing this at the special link party supporting Sandy Hook last week. Hope you'll come to The Humble Brag link party today to see some features from last week and link up some more cool projects. We also give away free ad space every week! Happy Friday!

    http://www.oneprojectcloser.com/the-humble-brag-link-party-13/

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