Wednesday, July 24, 2013

Ankh and Feather Pendant

No matter how much experience we have with our beads and color palettes, sometimes when a new design is started, we just have to cross our fingers and hope for the best. Even when the first few inches of beadwork look great, a finished piece can fall flat. Sometimes a sample that looks mediocre becomes an amazing design.

I was determined to use a dual palette of elemental colors with black and white accents for my Ma’at pendant, but I had a feeling that it wouldn’t look so great in the finished design. I chose olive for earth, aqua for water, red for fire, and royal blue for water. They looked great together on the hanks with black and white for accents, but had yet to be proven in the design. Furthermore, the trouble with double St. Petersburg chain is that you have to wait quite a while before seeing how the final pattern will look. Whenever I have doubts, I usually start the second row of stitches after finishing the first thread, just be sure that everything will look alright. Even though I used this precaution with Ma’at’s necklace, I still wasn’t sure how I’d like it in the end.

Maat Elemental Bead Palette Ma'at the Goddess of Balance


Once both chains were connected and the bone ankh pendant was on, I was relieved to find that the palette and pattern were just as good as I had hoped. Ma’at is all about balance and harmony, and I like the way the colors enhance the feathery look of St. Petersburg chain, and play well with each other.

Finishing this necklace was a little tricky, because I didn’t factor in bead sizes when decided which color to start with. The olive green seed beads have tiny holes, and when it came time to zip the first rows together, I ended up having to switch to a size 13 needle just to get the job done. Luckily, I didn’t break a needle in the process!

Maat the Feather Pendant


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4 comments:

  1. I love this color combination so much! The beadwork looks great with the pendant.

    ReplyDelete
  2. What a stunning necklace, Morti! Absolutely stunning. Love the way the feathers point to the Ma'at pendant.

    ReplyDelete
  3. The colors are bold and beautiful, the points are very defined and makes the neckless very desirable. I like it a lot. Sandra

    ReplyDelete

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