A garnet necklace and Audrey Hepburn

I can't believe another week has passed - but this time instead of being busy making jewellery, I have been busy having friends visit and stay, spending time with the family and so on. Really quite relaxing although my routine has flown out the window and getting my basic chores done is proving to be a bit of a problem!

One of my visitors this week is a great friend who in the past has made some stunning jewellery. She has been published with her designs twice and I have had some of her beautiful dichroic pendants on occasion. She has an affinity with gems as well, so of course I had to drag out some of my stones so we could ooh and ahh together! As a consequence I started to feel the old stirrings of desire to design and make some more jewellery.

So, this week I did make two necklaces - one of which is pictured above. It is 5 strands of beautiful, sparkling dark red garnet which feels glorious against your neck and is a pleasant weight - enough to know its there but not to overwhelm. To contrast the darkness of the stones and to add interest to the simplicity of the style, I have used a delicious sterling silver clasp that has a great amount of detail. Of course the clasp can be worn to the back as well. Do you like it?

When I design, I like to think of elegance and sophistication and one of the most inspiring figures to me is Audrey Hepburn. She was style personified (as well as a true humanitarian) and I have many pictures of her adorning my studio. 'Would Audrey wear it?' is a common question I ask myself during the design process! I also have quite a collection of books on Audrey, so was quite excited when I saw Audrey Hepburn: The Paramount Years on one of my favourite online gift stores, Tonic Gifts.