Sunday, March 4, 2012

The Accessories Are Coming Together!


Hi everyone! These past few days I have really focused on the accessories for my collection and have made a lot of progress on them so I figured I would share with you where I am at with them.  I have narrowed down all of the final accessories and have sorted out the millions of ideas going on in my head at this point haha! I have also finished a few so this post will have lots of pictures to show you them all! A few weeks ago I told you all that I had decided to turn away from my original thought of doing all knit accessories and instead make more polished and mixed material accessories and after finishing a few I am really happy that I went with my gut and made that decision. When all is said and done the accessories will have elements of fringe, gold chain, floss and metallic thread and leathers and vinyls. These materials all not only compliment and enhance my finished collection, but they also work really well together. I stayed within the same color pallet as my collection as well which I think helps to tie everything together and not distract from the collection.

Up first are two of the bracelets I have finished. The first is made from the same leather and vinyl that is used both in the collection and in some of the purses I am making as well. I found this really awesome technique of braiding the materials without cutting through the ends of them, sounds a little confusing I know, but once I figured it out, it really helped to give a polished finish to the bracelet. I then wove through different colors of the same material and stitched it onto a wider piece of the vinyl that I backed with black jersey. It has a double snap closure which not only helps to secure it easily to the wrist, but also allows it to fit on multiple different wrist sizes comfortably. 




The next bracelet uses different sizes of gold chain joined with a jump loop at either end and a spring ring clasp closure with multiple loops for sizing as well. I wanted to include some of the vinyl in this piece as well for some interest and decided to use the teal for a pop of color so I wove it through one of the larger chain pieces and secured it with a hand-stitched tack. 


I really like how both of these pieces turned out individually and am even happier with how well they go together when they are worn at the same time. 

I have also finished one of the necklaces that I had been working on. I have been seeing the bib-style necklaces everywhere it feels like these past few months and they have really interested me, but I hate things that are tight around my neck and most that I have seen have been just that, so I decided that for this collection I wanted to do a bib inspired necklace but put my own spin on it. This necklace has the gold chain base which I hand stitched a bib piece that I sewed individual beads to. I wanted to create a herringbone effect with the gold and black beads and broke it up with a vertical line of brown beads. I kept it longer and added an additional drape of chain on top of the beaded piece for added interest.


Once I finished that necklace, I wanted to keep in the same color scheme with the gold and black so I made a pair of drop earrings. These were super simple to make but the overall effect turned out awesome. I found this cording in the jewelry section of Jo Ann Fabrics that was heavier and had a thin wire running through the middle which really helps it hold whatever shape I put it into. I put this cording onto a loop and attached it to the earring. 


The final piece that I am really excited to show you is an across the body, fold over purse. Last summer on co-op in NYC a few of my friends had these awesome fold over purses. They are really cool because they look like a smaller purse, but they can hold a lot. I knew immediately that I wanted to do one of these purses for my collection. I decided to do this out of the teal vinyl and line it with a black stretch material. I brought the gold quilted detail in from the clothes in the collection and did this technique on the bottom portion of the purse. There is a simple magnetic snap closure on the inside of the bag and a gold chain with a black leather trim woven through it as the strap. This is probably one of my favorite accessories that I have made up to this point. 




I still have a few more accessories in the works. The fringe necklace that I wrote about earlier still needs to be completed as well as another bag and possibly some more earrings and things. I am going to switch back to clothing this week, but the accessories should be completed very soon! I hope you all enjoyed the pictures and like the accessories! I will be posting in the next day or so about some more garments so make sure to check back. As always, thanks for reading!

-xoxo Hillary C.

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