Trivial Pursuit earrings

I've been trying to buy less clothing, and generally secondhand, but just after Christmas I treated myself to a dress from Zuri Kenya. The pattern of the dress is called Trivial Pursuit, so of course I had to make myself a pair of Trivial Pursuit earrings to match!

I had picked up a Trivial Pursuit board game months earlier, with the thought of using the pieces in some crafts, so getting the dress got me started on that!

High style jewellery at low cost

I recently came across this magazine article about the latest jewellery must-haves, with prices that made me laugh because I have nearly all these items in my wardrobe at a fraction of the cost! In fact, most of these items cost £1 or less, with the most expensive being about £10. Those in the magazine article cost between £29 and £17,700, with most being in the hundreds!

So here are my tips for places to pick up high style jewellery at a low price!

Secondhand:

These beads cost about £1 from a charity shop. Other good places to look for secondhand jewellery include car boot sales, jumble sales, and antique shops.

Make your own:

I've lost one of these earrings, but I still like to wear the single one on its own! I repurposed an old pair of earrings by adding an embroidery thread tassel. The blue beaded hoops in the magazine article would also be easy to make.

Sales:

This necklace and these earrings were very cheap in the sales, I think £1 each. My favourite places to look include Miss Selfridge and Matalan.

Local boutiques:

Have a look around your local towns and cities to find interesting shops that sell jewellery. I've found some really unusual pieces in a couple of Edinburgh shops (although they have both closed down now). This necklace was the most expensive of those I've featured in this post, but at about £10 it was still much cheaper than those in the magazine!

Lucky dip bags:

This beaded bracelet was part of a £1 lucky dip bag at a shop in Edinburgh, which contained other items too. You could also make something like this really easily!

Charm jewellery workshop

Last month I went to a great jewellery making workshop held by Nikki McWilliams. This workshop was the brainchild of Nikki, who is best known for her biscuit cushions and pins, Rachel of Oh No Rachio, and Kim of Finest Imaginary, collectively known by their combined name of Oh No Finest Biscuit, and they run the class in various places either together or individually. I'd seen lots of the In Colourful Company crowd with these charm necklaces, so I swore that if the workshop came to Scotland I'd go along! I couldn't make it to the evening one in Glasgow the day before the In Colourful Company walk, but this one of Nikki's in Alloa was perfect for me!

Nikki had a wonderful setup in her workshop, with a large table in a bright room, and the four of us who were taking the class really enjoyed ourselves. It was fun to dig through the tubs of charms to find the perfect ones to represent our personalities, in the perfect colour schemes, and then decorate them with a bit of acrylic paint and attach them to a chain to make a necklace or bracelet. And there was even time to make a keyring/bullet journal charm too! I'd so enjoyed the Pistachio and Hibiscus doughnut from Tantrum Doughnuts on the colour walk, that I painted one of my charms to represent it!

Nikki being Nikki, there were of course some lovely biscuits and cakes provided! And while the cats did not make an appearance during the workshop we did get a peek at them as we left! There was also an opportunity to do a bit of shopping - Nikki had her lovely cushions and pins on display in the room we were working in, and we were allowed to have a rake through her Nikki's Supply Store stock! We all went home with our wallets somewhat lighter after that!

Mixtape necklace

Here's how I made a fun 80s-style mixtape necklace!

Starting with an audio tape, I filled the holes with blu-tak and covered the window with washi tape, then spray-painted it on all sides with pink paint.

I removed the washi tape and blu-tak, then advanced the tape slightly so the tape showing at the bottom would be black not pink! I will maybe add a little glue at each side of this so the tape can't be pulled out.

I traced around where the paper label was, and cut two from patterned paper, then glued one on each side.

I cut some white paper and wrote on it with black Sharpie marker, glued this in place then went over all the paper with a coat of varnish (I would have used Mod Podge but mine had dried out!).

I removed the screws at the top of the tape and, using slightly longer screws of a similar size, screwed some brass picture-hanging loops in place.

Finally I added a chain.

Another, easier, option for making it into a necklace is to hang the tape upside down, threading a cord through the holes.

80s-style painted bead necklace

One of the aspects of 80s style I really like is the combination of black and white patterns with bright punchy colours, and that’s what I was aiming for in this necklace. 

I started with three wooden beads that I spray-painted white, and one bead that was already pink. 

Once the spray-painted beads were dry, I painted different designs on them with black paint using a fine paintbrush. The paint had dried up a bit and gone blobby, so they are not as neat as I would have liked! 

Finally I strung all the beads on a piece of cord.

Ceard modernist jewellery

The obsession with Ceard jewellery began at an antiques fair where Mum and I both pounced on a brooch at the same instant, that reminded us of one of the town art sculptures in Glenrothes. Mum got the brooch, but we both started collecting at that moment.

Ceard is a Gaelic word, meaning maker or craftsperson, and the company itself was Scottish. The pieces of pewter jewellery are inspired by Scottish places and wildlife, but are in a modernist style.

We don’t know how many designs there are in total, but I’ve catalogued all those we’ve found (either pieces that we have, or photos that we’ve seen online).

I made a little zine for Mum with drawings of the different pieces of jewellery, but I could probably update it now because I’ve found more photos online!

Sea pottery mosaic brooch

I thought it would be fun to put some of my tiny pieces of sea pottery to a good use, so I decided on a brooch.

I had some grout left over from a mosaic kit I got in a charity shop, a wooden circle left over from a dollshouse kit, and a brooch pin, so I had everything I needed!

1. I started by laying out my pottery pieces on a wooden circle, to create a pleasing design. 

2. Once I'd decided on the placement, I glued them in place with PVA glue.

3. As the glue was drying I mixed the grout.

4. I spread the grout over the whole design, including round the edges, and wiped some of the excess off.

5. After the grout had dried a little, I wiped the rest of the excess off.

6. I glued a brooch pin on the back.

The whole thing took less than an hour to make, and it was all dry and ready to wear on my Seasalt dress the next day! I can't wait to gather more tiny pieces in different colours to make more jewellery!

Modernist jewellery exhibition

I really love modernist designs, and jewellery, so this exhibition at the National Museum of Scotland was perfect for me. I'd previously been to another exhibition there of Nordic modernist design, which contained a lot of jewellery, but I was pleased that there wasn't any overlap I could see between the items in the two exhibitions. 

This exhibition did have some Nordic designers featured, but had designers from other countries too.

Like at the previous exhibition, I did a drawing in my Moleskine of some of the items that particularly appealed to me, and added colour when I got home.