Venetian Delights!

....and a shake up for Graceful Deviant!

Having had a mammoth lack of motivation following my Canadian road trip (holiday blues doesn't quite cover it!) I was surprised by my boyfriend with a trip to Venice for our anniversary!
It was exactly what I needed to grab some inspiration and yet again, some awesome handmade goodies! On the morning we were due to fly home we took a boat over to the island of Murano, renowned for its glass making. I was in heaven and could quite easily spend a few days let alone a few hours especially as you could walk into factories and watch the makers creating their beautiful masterpieces. Here's some of my haul!

Silver lined glass drops, hollow formed beads and traditional millifiore rounds

Say 'hello' to my little friend!

Plus I had to get a little addition for my Christmas travel tree!
This stunning glass sculpture also makes a great pit stop for the birds!

So one of the reasons I think I was finding motivation difficult was because I was finding my work heading in too many directions and this was the case for both Graceful Deviant and The Blue Starfish. For Graceful Deviant it became simple - create work in collections. I have previously asked my Facebook following how they prefer to shop and the overriding feeling was by type, i.e necklace, earrings etc. So nothing changed on the website in terms of how you could search. But I have increasingly felt that for some it may look too diverse and so rather than change to shopping by collection only, the choice will be available! Having had a think on collection titles this is what will be available so far:

Plus there will be an additional 'Simply Silver' and 'Simply Gemstones' coming soon too as I seem to have underestimated the demand for things like simple hammered silver rings or just one gemstone as a pendant!
For The Blue Starfish jewellery I couldn't quite put my finger on exactly what my direction was after having recently tried my hand at a lot of new techniques which didn't seem to 'fit' my look.
It was only after seeing a lot of talk about autumn and the seasons combined with a comment a customer made to me at a handmade fair that I realised where I stood! The comment (and thinking back I get a few along these lines) was that the colours I use are so bright and complimentary. That's when I understood what my niche was - great colour combos that didn't necessarily follow the seasonal or high street trends! So that is what I will strive to continue!
The next blog post will feature a lot of new work for The Blue Starfish so I hope to see you then :)