Monika Wiklund

This is yet another variation of a chain necklace using a rough silver-colored chain, purple silver-foil beads, and faceted amethyst beads. The colors are very similar to this earlier necklace, but the composition and materials is more similar to another pair of earlier necklaces.

Photography by Kristian.

I think that lava stone beads work very well in combination with different semi-precious stones and I have made several necklaces using this theme. The earlier necklaces have been in more discrete colors, but I really like this combination of bright red coral and matte black  lava stone together with the heart shaped cinnabar pendant.

For this necklace, I used three different sizes of coral beads and two sizes of lava stone beads together with some cute metal spacers and a simple round toggle clasp. I really like the colors and the beautiful flower pattern of the pendant, but for some reason I haven’t used this necklace very much so far.

Photography by Kristian.

What makes this necklace different from other chain necklaces I have made is the beaded ball pendant that I made from 30 cube beads. I wanted to make a chain necklace from the green silver-foil beads that I had lying around, but I had nothing that I could use as a pendant and since I had some small cube beads in the same color I decided to try out the beaded ball description I had found a bit earlier.

I think that the beaded ball turned out very well, and that it fits in nicely with the rest of the necklace but it was a bit tricky to get the shape as close to round as was possible.

As you can see in the first picture, this is a fairly short chain necklace which is why I also added a small toggle clasp in the shape of a padlock.

Photography by Kristian.

Here is another version of this purple seed bead necklace that I posted about a while ago, but in blue instead of purple. Of course, the pattern is not quite the same in this necklace, I used slightly smaller seed beads in this version and I selected the colors to match the hues of the blue resin pendant. The darkest of the seed beads are selected to match the color of the faceted glass beads and to contrast to the lighter blue shades of the pendant. A cute detail is the small apple blossom clasp that I picked because I think that it matches the flower pendant.

This is a close-up of the very cute blue flower pendant with the apple blossom clasp in the background. It is also possible to see the small faceted glass beads with dark blue filling that I used as spacers between the different sections of the seed bead patterns.

Photography by Kristian.

As you might have noticed, I have made a lot of chain necklaces, partly because they are relatively easy to make and partly because chain necklaces are pretty popular so that I don’t have that many left anyway. This one is made from a thin chain with ovals and rings, some pretty nice metal cage links, mint-green silver-foil beads, and with a mint-green silver-foil heart as a pendant. Even though most of the necklaces are following the same pattern there is some variation in the colors, size and shape of the chains, and in the materials for most of the necklaces.

This is a close-up of the pendant and part of the chain of the necklace, it is a bit light, but I think that the color is pretty close to the real thing.

Photography by Kristian.

It has been a little while since my latest post, but I still have plenty of jewelry to post about. This one is definitely a favorite among my latest designs, a dark chain necklace with a hematite ankh pendant and a combination of metal flower links and diagonal hematite squares with red agate beads.

I created the chain by rebuilding a chain with double links since I think that it was a bit too much with doubled rings in each link. As you can see, the chain is dark gray and almost exactly the same color as the hematite which means that the red agate create a very nice contrast to the gray metal. The metal flower link right above the pendant is slightly larger than the rest, and since the ankh pendant is pretty thick and did not have any other holes I used a piece of suede string to fasten it to the flower link.

Photography by Kristian.

I figured that this glass pendant with a pattern of black, white and gold would fit pretty well together with these onyx beads, and since I had just tried out my Thing-a-ma-jig and made some metal links, I also wanted to use them for a necklace. After trying a few different combinations, I came up with this necklace and I think that it looks pretty good. The necklace is combined from a pretty thick chain, onyx coins, onyx lanterns, two different types of metal links, and a glass pendant with a smaller round onyx bead at the top.

I think that it is a bit tricky to make the metal links in the Thing-a-ma-jig so that they will hold the weight of the necklace and not bend out of shape too easily if the necklace gets caught in something, but I suppose that is mostly a matter of using thicker wire. These links turned out fairly ok, but it is definitely something I will have to keep practicing.

Photography by Kristian.

When I first made this necklace, I was a bit worried that it might be a bit too red and orange and that I would never be able to use it, but once I tried it on I found that it works very well with my coloring and especially if I use it together with dark or discretely colored clothing. Now this is one of my favorite necklaces, although I guess that really doesn’t say much considering how many necklaces I have…

The necklace is made of a mix of red agate and carnelian beads of different shapes and sizes, the small round beads and the rectangular beads are carnelian and the rest of the beads are made of red agate. It is made by using two strings and threading both strings through every second bead and threading them separately through two different beads in between. One of the strings is also threaded through the pendant with a carnelian bead at the bottom to keep it in place.

Photography by Kristian.

This is a necklace that I made a while back but that I have not had any pictures of until now. It is a fairly short chain necklace with faceted blue glass beads, a couple of blue window beads, and a millefiori star pendant. The chain is a thin silver-colored mother-son link with a simple hook clasp. I like the blue color of the beads, and the millefiori pendant is a bit different from what I normally use in my designs which makes it a bit more interesting than just another chain necklace.

Photography by Kristian.

I am almost always on the lookout for new types of chains, and I was very happy when I found the copper chain that I have used in this necklace. For some reason I have not had much luck with finding many variations of copper chains earlier, and this chain is a lot more interesting than the ones I had before. The colors of the copper goes very well with the red-brown round agate beads and the orange-red of the agate rings and the pendant, and the small delicate copper flowers also adds something extra. This is definitely one of my favorite necklaces, and I have used it several times already.

Photography by Kristian.