Studio tour

Last month I was approached by Michelle from the blog Roasted Montreal for a little Q&A and took the opportunity to send her some updated photos from my studio. As I have hardly made any update on that here, I though I'd show you the photos so you see how things look around here, at lear, how they look when it'd clean and tidy ;)

My studio is located in my home's basement which, thank goodness, is very bright, have lots of windows and during the day it doesn'tt look like a basement at all, with all the sun coming in. That may be my favourite part of it. On the downside, it's not very private. I share the space with my family: there's our tv space and library too. The idea is to close my space with a glass wall (we don't want to lose that light I told you about) but when is that going to happen? alas, I don't know. It's kind of a big project that won't come cheap and there are already other big projects for the house that are more urgent. But I'll stay positive and hopeful that this year I'll make enough dough to make my studio private! 

In the first pics you can see my desk, AKA packing station with all my bric-a-brac. Most of the time I work on my laptop there, too. As you can see window sill space is very well used with lots of curiosities and also tools and jewellery stuff. The there's my bench which I love to pieces. In the bench I do most work except soldering and oxidizing (for that nasty stuff I prefer to work on a restroom where we placed a special ventilating system for all the fumes from soldering) so it's always full of tools and current works and experiments. 

Overall, I enjoy this space so much and appreciate the fortune of having a place to make all the jewellery my heart desires. 

I hope you enjoyed the photos!

xx
Iveth

Heat wave

Unexpected.
The ways creativity hits you sometimes is quite amazing. I always find myself inspired by many things, as I'm sure every body does: you are reading a book, travelling, listening to a song, walking on the street, you find a beautiful branch or simply washing the dishes and then it hits you, bam! an idea that is full of possibilities.

Many months ago I was sleeping one night and I was dreaming: in my dream I was sitting on my bench, busy making a pair of earrings. The earrings were roundish, they were golden and on top of the gold piece there was a detail made of a silver metal that contrasted so nicely with the gold. The silver detail had this wavy shape on the bottom and they looked beautiful. First thing I did when I woke up was to run, open my sketch book and start drawing what I remembered. To my big surprise the following night the same happened, this time in my dream I was making a ring using the gold/silver material, just a simple band. Based on the earrings design/mix of metals I designed my new collection and when I was doing so, my awe was great as to the way everything had came, this unconscious idea, this unexpected gift from a dream. And now the collection is finished and I'm ready to show it and offer it to you! 

About dreams.
I couldn't be happier at how things came up: many dreams came to reality, not just literal dreams. One of them, to make a big necklace. The Heat Wave necklace is bigger than any necklace I've done before. I encounter a big problem when I was making it: I couldn't solder it with my torch, it wasn't potent enough. You see I have a portable torch, not a proper, professional one. The only solution is taking the big pieces of the necklace to a local studio so they can help me out with the soldering. This is opening new possibilities as I'm planning now on improving my work space to be able to get a decent torch at last and then I'll make it entirely at my studio!

Heat wave.
Once I sat at my bench to start making collection, all the colours and shapes started to make me think of the south of Mexico where I grew up: of the sun, the heat; I started seeing the shapes as metal melting and immediately started calling the collection 'heatwave'. For me this was a temporary name, something that came to my mind but I wanted to put it a name that reflected the way the collection was conceived but never came to think of anything and each day Heatwave grew more on me, now I believe it captures the feel of the collection entirely. 

So here it is, the work of a year at last available for you all to see and enjoy. I hope you love it as much as I do!


The rings.
I made three different rings for this collection: The heatwave, the Sunrise and the Sunset ring. 

The heat wave is just a big band that's tall on the front and gradually shortens on the back with a nice v detail. The Sunrise ring features a wavy design on the front, sort of like a little crown. And the Sunset features a round shape on the front. They can be worn with the design up or down, looks pretty cool both ways! All rings come in silver and brass.

The bracelet.
The cuff bracelet is made of brass but it also can be done in silver. It features a wavy design on the front of the bracelet and it's perfect to stack with other bracelets! 

The earrings: 

The earrings, oh the earrings! I just love them. Not only because they were the origin of the collection and the subconscious gifts of my sleepy mind but because the shape and contrasts are beautiful. They are made of brass ans sterling silver.

The necklaces: 
I made two necklaces, one is the Heat Wave necklace, a core to the collection and the other is the carved necklace. I originally planned to make a pair of earrings to complement this necklace but couldn't find the time, maybe in the future! This necklace is a long beauty that features a simple U shape for pendant and I carved a little line pattern on it. It's very simple, very minimalist and a fave of mine! 

Coming up next, I'll show you the rest of the photos of my lookbook that were shoot by Sarah-Emily St-Gelais and an amazing team that I can't wait to let you know of! Thank you so much for visiting my blog and for your amazing support! 

Iveth

Photo credits: product shoots by me and model shoots by Sarah Emily St-Gelais. Make up by Sarah Ladouceur, Clothing by Zoe G Kocsis and model is Katherine Berthelot.

Bits of the new studio space

My new studio space is a work in progress, I'll begin with that. It lacks privacy (we are going to build a wall that separates it from the family room in the basement) but the brightness and spaciousness make it up for that. Overall I feel very comfortable working here and very inspired.

Here are some photos I took a couple of days ago.

Lots of windows and natural light. I couldn't be happier :)

A Mountain Necklace

A little while ago I was asked by a lovely customer to make her a couple of Mountain necklaces that were just like my Mountain earrings. And although it's not the first time I thought about making my mountain into a necklace I encounter the same fear about the durability of the delicate dual polishing effect on my Mountains on a pendant which is touched, rubbed and scratched more often than earrings. So we came out with the idea of using layers and oxidization to clearly mark the lines and make the contrasts on this piece to endure. The results were pretty awesome and I'm completely in love with these necklaces!

Now, let me tell you something: I'm not usually fond of custom works BUT before you let your mind wander on that, I gotta tell you that when the right custom request comes along, I absolutely love making it possible for my costumers! What I love to make are their visions of my own work, you know? like what their own minds and fancy get when they see what I do and when they admire my style. Whenever that connection happens between my customer and my work, I cherish it and enjoy so much to hear about their vision + trying to make it possible.

Been very lucky lately in the custom request department: I also got a request by one of the singers I admire the most to make a necklace for another amazing singer I admire, it was awesome! I'll share some photos of that work soon.

What do you think of the Mountain necklace? are you loving it? would you like it to make and appearance on my shop? Thanks!!

Iveth

Making of: The Refuge Necklace

Last December we were so lucky to receive two of our best friends from Mexico who came to spend the holidays with us. Alty and Riki -my friends- are some of the most amazing, creative people I know and while they were here, Riki offered to make a little video of me while I was busy at work, making one of my most beloved pieces of jewelry: The Refuge Necklace.

I'm very happy he did this for me, as it's the first time I have an actual video of my process, of me working on the jewelry and such a lovely video it is! I hope you enjoy visiting my studio and see how things are in The Angry Weather HQ's for a day :)

The making of: The Refuge Neclace from ricardo meade on Vimeo.

Did you like it? I'd love to know if you have any questions regarding the process of making the Refuge necklace! And if you want to see more of Riki's work, come visit his Vimeo channel here!

Thank you so much Riki! Muchas gracias!

Iveth