Charm Necklaces for Anyone, Anytime

One of the major trends in jewelry lately has been the charm necklace.  Different things have been meant by that over the years from the early '90s charm bracelet like necklace to today's more minimal charm necklace. From a jewelry-lover's point of view, I like the charm necklace.  It's simple, can work with many styles of clothing, and can be easily layered for a unique personal look.  From an artisan's point of view, however, charm necklaces aren't as much fun since they usually don't require a lot of intricate work unless you are making your own sterling or gold charms.  On the other hand, (back to the jewelry lover) they are often much less expensive than ornate statement necklaces since a charm necklace may require only a few precious or semi-precious gemstones instead of a multitude of them.
   Some of my charm necklaces for Fall: above a sunstone charm necklace with 3 pretty sparkling oval sunstones that fal through a handmade loop that I textured with a small hammer. It can be made the length the customer desires. Above it is shown in gold-filled metal. Below is a charm or lariat necklace made with special Thai Karen Hill Tribes components and genuine blue sapphires.

Below, the chain is from the Karen Hill Tribes and the center charm is a candy jade faceted briolette; a Karen Hill Tribes charm (sterling) hangs beside the briolette.

This necklace would look great layered with another chain or two or another charm necklace with sterling silver charms or a pink or green gemstone.

Below, this charm necklace consists of a single drop made of three faceted dark blue genuine sapphires topped with a sterling heart.  It hangs from a sterling silver chain.

Below, this aventurine and abalone necklace is made with gold-filled rings and boasts a drop made of a genuine abalone shell.  The abalone is beautiful on both sides.

Above, carnelian earrings are made of gem-quality faceted carnelian gemstones and vermeil from Bali. I love the earwires with the flower decoration on them. Below, gold-filled accents complement the flat oval lapis stones here.

A lapis bracelet is centered with three of my favorite lapis nuggets.  These flat nuggets are sharply faceted and have a good sprinkling of pyrite for glitter.

Below, sunstone and smoky quartz are lovely together.  Gold-filled beads and a gold-filled twisted toggle are just right for the mixture!

Lariats: Pearls and Gemstones, Gold and Silver

I like lariats, but like some other things I forget, I sometimes forget to make them until I realize that the Lariat Necklace page has only a few necklaces on it, or I put one of my own around my neck and think how much I like fastening a necklace in the front. I always have to take a break at some point during the day when working on custom pieces, especially when I am trying to think how I want the finished result to look (when someone has simply said, "Make a necklace for me" when its design is left up to me. Working on a lariat takes me away from the task at hand and refreshes me, and usually it doesn't take me that long to make one.
Here are a few lariats I've made over the past couple of weeks at odd times.
Above, getting ready for September and its sapphire birthstone is a sapphire lariat necklace with sterling silver. And yes, those yellow gemstones forming the stamen of the flower are sapphires also.
Below is a lariat necklace featuring freshwater pearls, Biwa and coin, with mother of pearl and flashing rainbow moonstone. Hanging at the end is a special Karen Hill Tribes sterling silver dragonfly pendant and a carved mother of pearl flower and leaf.


Below is a lariat necklace made with a 14k goldfilled textured oval link chain, a Swarovski crystal copper butterfly, 14k goldfilled pansy, and a 14k goldfilled dragonfly and disk.
Finally, the last lariat is one that I put on and reluctantly took off when it was time to go home (I try on almost all my jewelry pieces, especially bracelets, to make sure that they hang correctly and are well-balanced). It's a sterling silver chain with a double toggle and one of my favorite colour combinations from Swarovski: morion and silk Swarovski crystals. It also features a little sterling shell charm and a butterfly charm from the Hill Tribes. (There are two pictures of it: one on a white background, and one on a black background - getting the subtle silk colour to show up is especially difficult - it's a pale peach).
I'll be posting these on the Cluny Grey Jewelry website the next two nights (days are for making jewelry; nights at home are when I do the online postings usually).


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Lariat Necklaces

I like to wear lariat necklaces myself, so it's a bit odd that I don't make them that often or make that many. I got started on these simply because I happened to catch a glimpse of one of the new Swarovski crystal rings as I was looking for some other beads. The ring was in one of my favorite colours - Copper - so I couldn't resist seeing what I could do with it. I decided not to do that much. I used 14 karat goldfilled chain and wire and attached the Swarovski crystal ring to one end, and a large copper bicone to the other with a few little bead accents. I put a Swarovski butterfly in copper to one side of the ring - and I'm in love with this lariat necklace.
Another of my favorite Swarovski colours is blue Montana and since to me it seems to be much more the colour of a real sapphire than Swarovski's actual sapphire colour, I used the Montana crystals to make a lariat that would also work as a birthstone necklace for September. This necklace is outstanding because of the wonderful Karen Hill Tribes chain with little links holding together huge hammered rounds and large flower shaped sterling. This is a rather long lariat necklace; one thing I like about it is that you can wear the back of it facing front during the day when you're at the office, then when you're ready to go out, you just turn it around and you have tons of sparkle! The large Swarovski crystals fit through the hoop, but I also added an almost indiscernible little ring clasp for those who may wear it out dancing.
Finally, a green aventurine lariat necklace made of aventurine disks, faceted olives, and carved flower beads. Here the loop that the other side goes through is made of the faceted olives, and because of the size of the loop, the other side can be looped through more than once to shorten the remainder.
All of these lariat necklaces can be found on the Lariat Necklaces page of the Cluny Grey website.

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