Stone of Destiny - Edinburgh

I think most of you have heard of the Creative Bead Chat group on FaceBook, and the new website Melinda Orr has started taking ideas generated in that group, called "Artisan Whimsy". If you have not heard of them, go there first and come back to read more :-)

Artisan Whimsy - A Creative Bead Chat

One of the teams there is the UK Artists Blog Team. They issued a challenge based on the home towns of members of that team. (The challenge page is here.)

The towns we could pick from were: Dorset, Edinburgh...and I stopped reading right there! I had visited the UK and Scotland back in 1992. I traveled to UK, France, Italy, Germany, Holland, Netherlands and Switzerland in that trip. Among all those fancy places, Edinburgh was my favorite. I loved it. A lot! I was not even looking for a challenge to pick up, was simply browsing blogs, but I could not stop myself from signing up for this! My beloved Edinburgh! How could I pass that up!

(By the way, the other towns are: Bath, Isle of Wight, Liverpool and Southampton)

The inspiration photo provided for Edinburgh was the Stone of Destiny:

It is a block of red sandstone, used for many centuries at the coronation of Scotland's monarchs. You can read more about its history here.

A couple weeks back, Miss Kristi Bowman sent me these gorgeous Red Sponge Coral beads that were just perfect for this challenge.

And then I looked up some pictures of Edinburgh castle. Liked this one on the National Geographic website:

And from that inspiration, came this:

My original idea was to use copper elements with the red beads. But I didn't seem to have the kind of copper chain I wanted for hanging the beads. Here's a closeup of the pendant, as you can see, the cubes are suspended with really fine antique brass chain.

Didn't have that in copper, and I always design my jewelry from materials I have on hand. So decided to use the antique brass. And I think this was a wise choice. The red of the beads is quite striking, so the darker antique brass looks much better than the reddish copper would have. Another thing I thought of was that the "fixtures" in the castle (door knockers, handles, what have you) would have been with this finish too. So this was all good :-)

I had four more of the red beads left over, and lately I am trying to make sets of necklace and earrings, instead of just one thing. So used a couple of the remaining beads to make these:

Simple and they go well with the necklace. (Simplicity is another thing I am trying to achieve in my designs these days)

So there you have it! My interpretation of the Edinburgh castle :-)

Here are the other participants:

The HostsLesley Watt Gossiping Goddess

Rebecca Anderson Songbeads

Pippa Chandler Pip's Jewellery

Teresa Hulley Bo Hulley Beads

Natalie McKenna Grubbi

Jo Tinley Daisychain Designs

Dorset

Gale White Bantering Bird on Flickr

Ginger Bishop Lilmummylikes

Cece Cormier The Beading Yogini

Therese Frank Therese’s Treasures

Cilla Watkins Tell Your Girlfriends

Sherry Baun

Kay Toodles and Binks

Edinburgh

Therese Frank Therese’s Treasures

Kashmira Patel Sadafulee

Caroline Dewison Blueberribeads

Pam Sears Crazy Creative Corner

Sherry Baun

Leigh Thow Jewellrleigh

Lucy Haslam

Bath

Cynthia Machata  http://antiquitytravelers.blogspot.com

Pam Sears Crazy Creative Corner

Sherry Baun

Isle of Wight

Duane Clark Bizzy Bead

Sharyl McMillian-Nelson Sharyl's Jewelry

Leigh Thow Jewellrleigh

Jean Wright Just Beadey

D Lynne Bowland Islandgirl’s Insights

Lisa Lodge Pine Ridge Treasures

Sherry Baun

Liverpool

Jean A. Wells  http://www.jeanawells.blogspot.com

Shalini Austin   Jewellery by Shalini

Doris Stumpf Glaszwerg

Sherry Baun

Lennis C Windbent

Southampton

Sherri Stokey Knot Just Macramé

Sherry Baun

Leigh Thow Jewellrleigh

Kathy Lindemer Bay Moon Design

The last day for submission to this challenge is November 12, so do drop by there close to that date to see all the gorgeous work that the UK has inspired!