Jewelry made of gold or silver? Some designers find this way too boring - and turn to highly unusual materials instead. How about concrete earrings, bracelets made of books and moss rings for a change?
Image: Eva Chloe Vazaka
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5 everyday materials you probably didn't know could be turned into jewelry
Jewelry made of gold or silver? Some designers seem to think that's too boring - and turn to highly unusual materials instead. How about concrete earrings, bracelets made of laminate and moss rings for a change?
Image: flickr/jeneen.nicole
Jewelry that matches with the city
Pearls made of concrete - just the thing for the urban working woman, or perhaps for fans of bare walls. For her pendants, earrings and rings, Berlin-based designer Miriam Arentz mixes and pours the concrete herself. Concrete jewelry is certainly the epitome of understatement. The light grey color is also a good match for every outfit.
Image: Juliane Halsinger/Captivation
Jewelry that makes you feel smart
Wearing a favorite book around one's neck isn't really an option - but Jeremy May has the perfect solution. It takes the British designer eight weeks to whittle rings, pendants and bracelets for book-lovers. He even reads each book to inspire the shape he'll give to the piece of jewelry.
Image: Eva Chloe Vazaka
Jewelry that makes you ride
At first sight, you'd never think this necklace used to be a bicycle chain. Lina Lundberg takes the chain apart, and puts it together again with real pearls - an entirely new composition. The Swedish designer had the idea one day when cleaning her bike. The unique necklaces cost up to 700 euros ($784).
Image: Lina Lundberg
Jewelry that takes the floor
You've just finished laying a new laminate floor, and have some material left over? British designer Bethan Laura Wood uses bits of multi-colored wood laminate to make bracelets. Blocs of laminate are cut up and smoothed. The result is a piece of jewelry that looks nothing like the top surface of a floor.
Image: DW
Jewelry that brings you back to earth
Who, if not a native of Iceland, would ever have this idea? Designer Hafsteinn Juliusson embeds moss, which is available in abundance in home country, into silver rings. It's supposed to stay fresh for about 12 weeks. The unusual experiment aims to connect people with nature.
Image: flickr/jeneen.nicole
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Statement jewelry is a word that crops up a lot in fashion magazines these days. And it doesn't refer to making a political statement, like in the days of the good old peace sign on a leather band. It's rather a piece of jewelry that is particularly striking or flamboyant, either because of its size, color or material. The statement is: Look at me!
Jeremy May's jewelry is a special statement in that it's not only highly noticeable because it is made of dozens, sometimes even hundreds of book pages pasted together, but contains the printed word on those pages as well: a double statement.
Wear your favorite book
Painstakingly, the designer uses one book for each piece of jewelry. On the first page, Jeremy May marks the contours of, say, a ring. Then he uses a scalpel to cut out each page, carefully stacking them with an occasional snippet of colored paper, and then pastes the bits together.
How he does exactly will remain his secret. He says he has experimented for two years before getting it right. In the end, the paper ring is smoothed, filed and varnished until it's a piece of jewelry that's not only waterproof, but feels a bit like wood. Every piece is unique.
May has customers all over the world, book lovers just like the designer. They often ask for jewelry made from their favorite book. May scours flea markets and used book stores to find a good copy, which also has to be quite thick to supply the volume needed for the rocks. The book later serves as a jewelry box for the ring, bracelet or earring.
