Holiday Sale!

 

It's that time again - to shop till your fingers fall off in an all-day, online bonanza from Black Friday to Cyber Monday. Or something like that.

Enjoy FREE SHIPPING on all US orders in the Clementine shop from now thru Monday, Nov 28th, and use the code TURKEY20 at checkout starting Thursday at midnight to save 20% off your order! 

Happy Thanksgiving to all my US friends and customers, I'm ever-grateful for you!

Stack 'em high.

 The Clementine labradorite ring Jennifer now wears.

 My new Odette leaf ring.

 Jennifer's mix-and-match stack.

While at the rousingly successful pop-up shop hosted by Melissa and Marichelle, I got to do some shopping for me. I already have a large collection of pieces by Jennifer of Odette NY, but clearly I needed more. And she needed a new labradorite and goldfill ring that I just recently finished. So we traded. Gotta love that. I also pulled all the rings off Jeni's wedding ring finger for up-close oggling. So much pretty! There are some Satomi Kawakita pieces in there. I am a firm believer in the mix-and-match, stack-and-stack-some-more philosophy when it comes to rings.

Flora and Mineral

I've been experimenting with something totally new and strange—in a good way. Born entirely of a suggestion by Lauren (of Lauren Haupt Jewelry) who came up with the idea when she saw my moss- and mercury-glass-filled display at the May Bust Craftacular show, it's a combination of flora and minerals—a gemarium! After a lot of research and experimenting, I've produced something I'm pretty excited about. And they will be debuting exclusively at the Melissa Loves Pop-Up Show on Nov. 12th. If you're in the NY/NJ area, you should absolutely plan to attend, it's going to be a great day of shopping and eating with a very cool array of artists and makers. And maybe you'll snag one of these gorgeous, mossy wonders.

LeWitt.

3 floors full of wall drawings - the Sol LeWitt retrospective at MASS MoCA is huge and impressive. The colorful later work is what everyone recognizes, but I really enjoyed his earliest work, which was so focused and minute and cool - just a blank white wall and a graphite pencil.

The installation will be up for 25 years, so don't feel like you have to rush on over there or anything. But you might want to add it to your "someday" list.

{all photos taken on my phone. again.}

Suck it, Madonna.

I don't know if you heard the news, but apparently, last week Madonna announced that she "hates" hydrangeas. I think my late-season beauties clearly convey how very, very sad and soulless Madge must be. Look at the selective, gorgeous decay; the dusted quality to the coloring! Perfection.

Grosse.

Katharina Grosse, "one floor up more highly" at MASSMoCA.

The installation is enormous and shockingly, vibrantly colorful. Vertiginous cliffs of styrofoam contrast with piles of dirt and rocks, sprayed a rainbow of color. To me, it questioned what we consider precious: the things we pull out of the earth, the things we adorn ourselves with and the things that we discard. It was a striking display.

Air and space.

 

What do you do when visiting friends in D.C. during a withering July heatwave (I mean, besides going out for Ethiopian food, which seemed obvious)? Go to the Smithsonian Air and Space hangar at the airport, of course! In keeping with the subject matter, the best views were from below, looking straight up.

 

(all photos taken on my phone!)

demolition derby

Nothing says 'late summer fun' quite like crashing some crappy cars into one another, right?? While it's not as down-and-dirty-enjoyable as the one at the Cummington Fair (which I missed this year), the derby at the Tri-County Fair in Northampton fit the bill.

BEFORE:

 AFTER:

Departing Penland

We took a little detour for some bad news posts there, sorry for that. I have a final round of photos from my time at the Penland School of Crafts to share with you, though - a little more up-beat, no?!

We spent many and long hours in the studio, each following our own direction - trying and failing and trying again. But we also spent many hours socializing, laughing, and generally embracing the whole "camp" thing. Except this time there was booze.

On the final full day of the session, there's always an auction to benefit the scholarship fund at the school. I created this ring to be auctioned off. The glass piece was made by a student in the stained glass studio: white with an etched arrow. I created a double band - sterling inside, copper outside, then made a two-tone bezel (sterling and copper) for the arrow. Finally, I affixed the arrow to the band using a rivet, which allowed the arrow to spin. NICE. The piece sold for $160, which I was super happy about. I felt like I really went out on a high note, after all the frustrations I encountered midway through. All in all, it was an exhausting, overwhelming, amazing experience.