Seth Damm

SETH DAMM
is an artist designer whom has created this series of sculptural rope jewellery with 100% hand dyed cotton. The pieces are designed to be worn and also work as wall hangings as the beautiful structure and colour make for a work of art.
They come in at a range of prices, ranging from around £120 to £250. They are like wearable art, bold statement pieces but made with sense of delicacy, little wraps of satin and ribbon, enticing the twist and fixing the form. They fall into the middle price range of jewellery, but with a range of prices they are more available for a larger audience.

This is something I want to explore in my practice, having a higher priced bolder collection and then a more accessible range, allowing for a larger spectrum of audience. I feel Seth Damm's audience is relevant to me as I too want to incorporate this idea of creating wearable art at a high end yet realistic price banner.

"Double Chain"

"MB"

 http://sethdamm.net/home.html

Explorations into the figure of 8 wrap

For my live brief I have decided to work towards the Paris brief, an embroidery exhibition at L'aiguielle en Fete, the Paris consumer show for needle crafts.

For this brief we have been having additional tutorials to further and produce a piece for this.

I have had a tassel and bead ban put upon me which I can see is potentially beneficial.

photo copied and illuminated

Samples are begging to get a little bit fussy, limited by their decoration and the time that involves.

Where what is working better is the quicker act, that sometimes when you loose the precious act of making, something much more interesting begins to happen. Beading, embellishment and tassels are something important to me and which I will revisit but for now they are on the back burner.

 

a much more successful sample, bigger and bolder.

Chains

A point of interest (aha moment)
A new definition on chains.
I came across this beautiful image on Instagram,  a jewellery piece by a brand called Takara. I have been starting to consider the idea of the chain and how to go about constructing one but was struggling with creating something substantial. This Takara neck piece creates a beautiful alternative to just a pendant on a string as well as still having quite an organic feel to it.

 Takara

Spring/Summer 2013 collection

Therefore I began to try to suss out how it was constructed, after a couple of futile attempts of trying fishtail plats and various knotting techniques, I came to the conclusion it was a form of wrapping around something in a figure of 8 construction.

My first attempt, taking something simple like wool and experimenting with various yarns and strings. The free nature of the wool resulted in quite a weak finish, too light and delicate.

 

Failure of the wool, I tried the technique on two strings of chain, using the figure of 8 wrap to bind the two together, resulting in a break through sample. The thread completely covers the chain, hiding it from view but also giving it a bit of weight which I think to be of some importance in jewellery. The covered chain also results in quite am appealing aesthetic, tonally and texturally.  

I continued this exploration into the figure of 8 by trying it with different thicknesses of cord and rolled tape. It wasn't nearly as successful due to cord making it too rigid, not forgiving enough to have a malleable form. Also due to the flat texture of the cords, it made the surface quite unremarkable, unlike the chain which creates a really appealing texture.