It’s hard to believe, but it’s already almost the end of November, and it’s fast approaching the busiest shopping time of year! Between the gorgeous ambers that we have been lucky enough to find, the stunning Limited Editions for Christmas and Black Friday 2016, oh – and shopping for gifts for others… there are so many tempting treats at Tartooful.
Over the next few days, we at Tartooful are excited to be able to present some great “Black Friday” SALE pricing on yummy Trollbeads Treats…
- 30% off all earrings, rings and on selected Fantasy necklace styles
- 10% off on all purchases over CAD$200
- free purple jewel pouch with purchase, while supplies last
- 25% off on “Daylight Brilliance”, this year’s stunning “Black Friday Limited Edition
- “Build Your Own” Group 1 kit CAD$160 (in store or by email/phone)
Browse our online shop now, or we would be delighted to offer personal service by email: tartooful@gmail.com or telephone: 604-924-0122. Hope to see you in the Village soon!
C.
Today, November 1st, is a cluttered black square of type in my calendar… It’s the first day of the month, with all of the financial deadlines and chores that accompany a fresh month…it’s the day after Hallow’een, so we are all just a little groggy from sugar overload and a sleep punctuated with fireworks and firecrackers. It’s also All Saints Day in the Christian calendar, or Samhain in the Celtic Pagan calendar. No matter what your cultural background, here in the Northern Hemishphere there is no questioning the shift in light that accompanies the beginning of November.
The beginning of November feels like a shift. Suddenly we expect the nights to be long, we expect the days to be cold and we look to the days of Winter ahead. I awake in surreal darkness, convincing my skeptical body that it really is time to get up… and on rainy days it sometimes feels as though it never really gets fully light. Curls of slate coloured clouds catch on the curves of our local mountains and lazily hang there waiting for a breath of wind to push them along. No wonder, then, that just now the veil feels thin between the world of the living and the world of those who have gone before.
So what are we to do? Shiver here in our dim, grey existence? Hardly! We North Westerners have perfected our strategies for warmth and light. We celebrate the contrast of light and dark in thousands of tiny ways. Some examples… You’ll find brilliantly uplit, spectacular trees in most gardens in my neighborhood. That pop of green light is even more beautiful for being embraced by darkness. we light our houses more and more as the very darkest time of year approaches, and by Christmas the entire city is aglow. Inside you’ll find candles and fireplaces are de rigueur to banish the November chill and in the very darkest months I’ll even light candles at the breakfast table!
Today we’re playing with the classic palette of deep, lustrous garnet and a royal tone of purple. Inspired by the exceptionally pretty stone on this Fantasy necklace, we decided to tease together a quick and simple necklace, using the elegant “Freedom Feather” silver pendant as a focal point. This useful pendant is designed to frame the droplet at the bottom of a fantasy necklace, and gives a much more substantial and dramatic effect than the droplet alone. It feels like an integrated part of the necklace, not an added “bead”, and could easily be worn completely on its own on a Fantasy necklace.
Casting an eye over our selection of uniques today I noticed that we have an absolutely marvelous collection of raspberry pinks in stock at the moment. I decided to have a bit of a play with them, but thought I’d give the design a little twist and try my hand at a crimson-to-pale pink ombre composition….
together it was bound to be a fantastic bracelet. I really think that with these beads it would be impossible to make the bracelet look anything but gorgeous.
At the two extreme ends of this bracelet design you’ll find some of the opaque unique beads that are such a delight to true collectors. The rich red and glittery one shown above has actually been tempting me for my own collection! So luxe and utterly delicious. At the other end of the bracelet be sure to note the beads that have elegantly formed flowers traced on milk glass backgrounds. These have been such a lovely fresh addition to the design oeuvre of glass Trollbeads uniques. I’d love to see an entire bracelet made up of these delicate beauties.
Clockwise from clasp: “Lace Lock”, All Glass beads uniques. Silvers: “Spiritual Ornament”, “Elderflowers”, “Spiritual Adornment”, “Wine Harvest”.
The time of year when we all dust off our best pumpkin, citrus and cinnamon coloured beads and create combinations to honour Thanksgiving, Fall Equinox, Back to School, Harvest Moon, Halloween and the warm low light of Autumn. Every season has its colour mood, and no question that no matter how you like to celebrate Autumn, with subtle earthy browns or stark ghostly black and white – orange is the queen of the Fall palette.
The arrival of a group of spectacular yellow glitter uniques, as well as a punchy new olive glass colour had me eagerly anticipating this annual ritual even more than usual. Olive has traditionally been a bit of a tricky colour to find in the Trollbeads collection… there have been a few beads with cool, blue-olives, but very few with a true, acid soaked sort of an olive green. I was delighted when we received a few precious uniques with this very fresh colour and immediately resolved to combine them with rich golden yellows and tangy oranges for a fantastic, citrus take on Autumnal orange.
A bracelet with this much texture, rich colour and visual energy needs a few places designed for the weary eye to rest, so I showed restraint, and kept silvers minimal and calm. The silvers in this combination create colour groupings that are meant to be viewed as a whole… then suggest a pause to the eye before moving on to the next group. For that reason I selected simple, abstract silvers of a similar size and shape that would quietly fulfill their role and not demand too much of one’s attention when viewing the bracelet.
I began by placing “Victory” in the center of the necklace composition. This marvelously large and dramatic piece melds organic, round forms with angular, chevron forms. This was a fit choice, as it happily accommodates both rounded designs such as “Three siblings”, “Transformation” and “Trefoil Knot”, as well as more angular items such as “Smiling Cylinder” and “Two Sides to Everything”. As I built outwards in the composition I occasionally added a matched pair of beads. This gives a sense of balance and rhythm to the design, without the rigidity – not to mention predictability – of a perfectly matched set of paired beads.
Have fun browsing!
tartooful 