Monday, May 31, 2010

Commission Missions

I regularly get asked whether I make commissioned pieces, and the answer is yes, I do! In fact, I generally love doing one off pieces, as its usually designs I'd never really thought of, and sometimes inspires a whole new train of thought. So here's a little story on how commissions come about...

Recently I was contacted on Etsy, by a sea-loving lady called Breezy Brenda, who had been looking for a mermaid necklace for some time. Having discovered Love From Hetty and Dave, she decided commissioning a mermaid was the way forward...


Brenda gave me some ideas of what she wanted: aquamarine or seafoam colors with maybe peach, mango, kiwi, silver or gold accents, flesh tones for arms and face, light brown hair, flower in her hair etc. and she wanted her to be flashy with sequins and pearls, in a horizontal swimming mode instead of a vertical one.

So the next step was finding an image to work from, and putting together a selection of colours...
This was what I came up with:


The metallic aquamarine snake print leather was perfect for this project.

Next I cut out and stuck the leather pieces together, to make up the basic mermaid shape:



At this point, I had the design okayed by Brenda, and then it was time for the stitching and embellishment to commence.

It's surprising how different it looks after stitching:



So now, this little Mermaid is leaving the seaside in Bournemouth, to live on Brenda's neck in Nashville, Tennesee. And as a jeweller herself, Brenda will attach a chain of her choice once she receives her mermaid, so I look forward to seeing her photos of it all finished.

So if there's something special you would like made up, don't be scared to contact me to commission a one-off personalised piece. Just send an email to zoelarkins@googlemail.com

Here are some more examples of bespoke pieces I have made, to get you excited...

A lovers handbag...


'Faithful' and 'Unfaithful' keyrings. Not sure what the story was behind these!


Cupcake brooches for DJs Amy & Susan


Wedding date keyrings



Commissions start from £25 and up.

Bespoke Lovings

xx

1 comment:

Unknown said...

That finished mermaid looks really fantastic! Ha would love to know what's been going on with the faithfuls and unfaithfuls!