theme for the book?

I have been thinking about how I could make my paper jewellery book more interesting. Perhaps showcasing the designs of jewellers in paper or showing a history of jewellery, throughout the times... Victorian jewellery for example. Then I thought back to one of my passions, tattoos (above is a part of my most recent tattoo). 

I have been looking into the history of tattoos, all the different styles and how they vary in different countries, both in how they are done and their styles. These range from the bronze age, Egyptian, Polynesian, Japanese, Ancient Greece and Rome, Celtic and Vikings among others. I think this could be an interesting thing to look into for my project. Maybe making each item of jewellery typical of a country or time. I have more research to do and I am hopefully going to do some research in a tattoo studio.

book of paper jewellery

I came up with a new idea of making a book of paper jewellery. Each page of the book would have a different item of jewellery that the user can pull out and wear. It would just be one use and then recycled, so sort of a sustainable type of jewellery maybe. I also thought about each page being screen printed or have different illustrations on them. Possibly a showcase for different artists?  

I have decided to steer clear of the wedding anniversary materials route now. After a lot of thinking, I know it's not me. I have lost all faith in marriage and most relationships in fact! So I think it would be hypocritical of me to do a project based around it. I am so much happier with my book of paper jewellery idea, however, I need to give it more depth, possibly a theme. 

change in direction?

After all the experimenting with making origami with different materials, it might not be possible to make them all like origami. I am going to have to rethink my plan! I could still focus on origami but with flower petals, for example. I could still use the wedding anniversary materials or I could do something completely different! I need to think!

13th anniversary: lace

For lace, I experimented with moulding it in resin. It was still pliable enough to be bended which could be made into origami. I could also laser cut the lines to fold to make them more precise- I will try this with the flower petals in resin as well. 

9th anniversary: copper

I used copper mesh to bend into origami shapes but I would like them to be more intricate. I think I would have to use tools to make them more detailed.

8th anniversary: salt

I face the same problems with salt as I did sugar. I used rock salt because it is coarser and shows up better when it was moulded. I moulded it in latex as well as resin. I like the resin as it looks like jewels and would be an usual piece of jewellery.

6th anniversary: sugar

Sugar is going to be difficult to make origami out of! I tried moulding sugar in resin which looked quite nice and could be used as part of a piece of jewellery (I also tried different colours with food colourings) but this is going off brief.

5th anniversary: wood

For wood, I got a pattern for origami folds and laser cut them onto a rough piece of wood. I think, to make it look more like origami I would have to construct different pieces of wood together and make them fit to create a model. 

4th anniversary: flowers

I have found the flowers really interesting to work with. I have put some petals and leaves in resin which look quite nice but they tend to discolour in the resin. I also sprayed some in varnish which kept the colour better but I'm not sure if they will last as long. I have also made basic jewellery out of biodegradable plant pots. They have seeds inside them so the wearer can eventually plant them to let the flower grow.

3rd anniversary: leather

The leather was quite difficult to make intricate shapes out of as it is so thick, I couldn't even sew parts to help the structure stay in place. I folded this simple shape & tried ironing and used a small amount of glue to hold it all together. I would like to find a way to the leather look more delicate because I can't get crisp, defined points when folding at the moment.

1st anniversary: cotton

The first of the anniversary materials is cotton. I used plain pieces of cotton & ironed them as I folded the origami shapes. I added a few layers of hairspray as well to make the material stiffer. I really liked the outcome, it looks similar to paper but has a more interesting texture.