Golden Flights

One of my favorite things to do here in Montreal (where Norwegian Wood is based) is to check out the local flea markets, or Marche Aux Puces as they're called here. We try to go pretty often, and after awhile you start to get to know some of the vendors, which is my secret to getting all the really great stuff. One of my favorite vendors is a woman who only sells jewelry. Necklaces, bangles, earrings, pins, everything you could imagine is in this womans stall. So I always make a point of stopping in for a visit when we go. On a recent trip I found the most incredibly confusing necklace, but was mesmerized by it.

Frankly, it was ugly, it hung weird, it made no sense. It was the perfect example of an object that is LESS than equal to the sum of its parts. Meaning...the components were great, but the way it was put together was horrible. So of course I bought it and took it apart, and many parts of this weird necklace ended up in this one-of-a-kind "Golden Flights" necklace, which is one of my favorite necklace designs to date!


I combined these vintage components with some new metal details (chain, rings, studs, etc.) and added the leather neck strap, which I'm in LOVE with. I love the colour of the leather with gold metal, I love the scratchy pattern embossed into the leather, and I love the soft but sturdy feel of the leather.I wanted to carry over the theme of the bundled feathers from the previous necklace I did, but this time I used a combination of rooster hackle feathers and black spotted pheasant feathers. I think the grey in the pheasant feathers adds a nice third level of colour into the bundles, and the little black tips add a nice graphic touch.

The small leather tassles are also placed throughout the feathers and on the top tier gold chain. The small gold stud was used on all these mini tassles, they're so tough yet refined, the perfect pairing for this piece.

xo
Angie

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Update from Cherie:

Sorry this one is now SOLD only FOUR pieces left!
Go peek now to grab yours!

Storm of Feathers

Hi guys, Angie here, back again to share with you the first of my necklace designs, made just for Shrimpton Couture. Many of you may have seen the plethora of fringe necklaces and earrings in my Etsy shop, but for this special edition necklace I wanted to make something TRULY one of a kind, something that I could really only make one of, so I knew I had to start with some sort of vintage piece from my stash of goodies.


I sorted through my many boxes and drawers of trims, ribbons, buttons, clasps and chains, and found this great strip of metal mesh, which has always seemed kind of futuristic/post-apocalyptic to me, but yet also very 70s disco. Soooooo futuristic post-apocalyptic disco.

Of course.


So this was my starting point, and from there I came up with the metallic/purply/slightly gothic colour palette of black/silver/lilac and knew that these lilac feathers I had would be perfect. In order to attach the feathers to the chain I made little bundles of three feathers, with the curves of each feather pointing outwards and connected them with small silver fasteners. I love these little bundles, I think they look sweet enough to eat.


I've been wanting to do some sort of bib shaped necklace for awhile, so I pulled out my leather bin (yes, a whole bin...the hoarding problem is deep) looked through my leathers and found a great black leather with a subtle swirling zebra-esque pattern embossed on it. Perfect.


From there I began playing around with the metal mesh, silver chain and some jump rings (the rings used to connect chain) and discovered that some of my rings were the perfect size to fit right through the mesh, and the design was born from that. So from there I just played around, adding chain, taking off chain, playing with the shape of the leather bib, moving feathers around, until I was completely happy with the design. In the end this piece reminds me a bit of a storm: the cloud of feathers, the metallic strips reminiscent of the electricity/lightning, and the fringe the heavy flow of dark rain. Whoa man, that's totally deep.

xo
Angie