Beading Vintage Lace

Vintage lace update: In my latest rummage sale vintage  lace find  was a piece of this very delicate lace...I tried beading  a small piece, but the lace was too delicate and tore. I have been looking at large hole beads but nothing has excited me yet and pretty pricey as well. There was a local gem fair, and my friend took me in tow to show me around the exhibits. We went on the  hunt for  big hole beads.  My friend saw these MOP rings strung like beads and wondered if they would work. The rings had the potential to "bead"  my brittle lace. I've worked on this piece most of the day. I reworked it 4 times..lots of ribbon and wire work to support lace. Still needle work to finish and wire cleanup...I'm not sure I like how this turned out, but I did figure out another way to solve the lace-to- chain connection dilemma! (I ran wire  through the lace for support, threaded on a pearl and wrapped the pearl and wire around the wire stringing the "doughnut"connecting ring together. Finished by weaving ribbon around the lace to cover wires ..not wearable with wires poking out)  Sounds complicated?    IT WAS!!!

Wedding necklace..Lots of needlework

I have 40 hours of stitching and threading into this piece.  Whew!!  Wedding necklace.

I used wire and weaved it through the lace to attach the vintage MOP buttons, acrylic crystals and pearl beads.  I hand stitched the bottom two lace pieces together and attached the LARGE beautiful MOP button as a focal piece and anchor to hold the two lace pieces together as well.   It was all done.. or so I thought until I tried it on.  The wires scratched!!  I then had to hand sew a piece of soft ribbon on the back of the whole piece so it would be wearable.

Just because a necklace is pretty doesn't mean it's wearable...always check .. and secure or snip wire ends  or button backs to make for comfortable wearing.

Vintage Repurposed

The box of jewelry findings I was given yesterday, turned out to be a treasure for me today!  This is my most favorite necklace that I have made to date. Most of the green stones are vintage cut glass. I also took some parts from another bracelet belonging to my great-grandmother to make the lower pendant and several of the upper chain pieces.  I had to add a new chain, the older chain was brittle and kept breaking.  Old meets new!! Beautiful and repurposed!

Broken jewelry? or Vintage treasure?

 I received a box of  broken jewelry bits and pieces

today.  I started to do some work on this necklace, but the chain is proving to be problematic. The chain is old and brittle...may require a chain switch out.  Beautiful green glass pieces.  I never know what I'll find in a box of broken jewelry offerings!!  Or what repurposed creation will result.....

Image this with vintage lace....

 This necklace was made with a modern piece of used ribbon from a wedding present...soft satin wired ribbon and some beads.....I'M LEARNING to make mock ups of necklaces using normal findings so I can discover where any difficulties may arise before committing vintage lace etc. to a project.

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Imagine using vintage lace (and large hole beads so as to not tear the fragile lace).....

This would need some wiring to hold the shape with vintage laces, but it could be a beautiful and pretty way to repurpose and display special laces.



UPDATE:   Another piece of ribbon,, another easy necklace!
Also a slightly different version using a scrap of silky scarf material, some beads and a pendant.

Lace and buttons...first try

Latest button necklace creation was fun but irritating. Combining metals, lace, buttons and crystals was difficult and I made a lot of changes figuring it out. So many buttons so little time..

A piece of vintage lace

A friend of mine passed on a box of vintage buttons and trimmings  to me hoping I could find a good use for them.
Included in the box, was a long piece of lace that was in reasonable shape and could take being beaded.  I used wire and ribbon to support the lace, beads and buttons. This was complicated.... hard trying to figure out the how to pull lace, ribbon, & wire together to finish the closing and focal piece. I was threading lace, wire and ribbon through EVERY bead I added!!! I took it apart a couple of times before I finally finished.  I should have planned this out better, but I really do my best problem-solving tactically using the materials causing the problem to solve the problem. I am truly a hands-on learner.

Thank You Sally Epley for these treasures!!

Vintage button: a genealogy clue?

 Found this very old button in my button collection...could be an artifact from my Swiss Keller's....

Earrings from vintage buttons

Button update: I made a set of earrings from these pretty silver buttons...and another set from pearl buttons.

Button Treasures

Button treasures: in my button collection I found many of these TINY hand-made shell carved/pearl buttons, probably hand drilled that are 1/4" or smaller. I'm assuming they were for baby clothes, but couldn't pick them up without tweezers let alone button them on something. Who put all the time into making these tiny things? The hand-painted ceramic heart is a wonder and thing of delicate beauty. But the winking eye button so out of place among-st the ancient other buttons made me LMAO....still giggling over it!!

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Buttons handed down

I have a huge jar of buttons. Clothing buttons. Buttons handed down to me from my mother and grandmother. Buttons handed down to them as well. Many of the button are very old. Each button tells a story...they bring back memories and give me a peek back in time about my ancestors' lives. So in the spirit of preserving the past and to honor those whose buttons have been passed down to me..I'm making some necklaces out of the buttons. It no coincidence then, that two of the gold buttons I used were engraved with the letter "c" ...more than likely belonging to my Grandmother Nora Caroline Keller. Thanks Grandma, for sharing your buttons. I think she'd approve of the new use for her hand-me-down buttons.

Christmas in September?

 I am currently working on a quick project with my daughter-in-law to create some unique vintage-looking Christmas ornaments. I did not use vintage lace or buttons for this ornament..it was a "mock up" using modern craft materials, beads, lace, ribbon, and fabrics.  But you could easily use a vintage piece of lace to cover this, use older lace around the outside or to create a loop to hang the ornaments,
use vintage buttons or pearls to show off the lace...It mostly depends on what materials you have available and how much you want to spend. But have fun creating...this ornament took me about an hour to make..

Big Shiny Vintage Buttons

  I use many kinds of vintage buttons to make necklaces.  I like big shiny ones especially... to often make beautiful focal pieces for necklaces. Big buttons are often hard to find, and come at a premium when purchasing them. 
  Finding the right buttons I need is one issue...but connecting buttons-to-chain is another problem: jump rings, wire, chain, thread, ribbon...every necklace has it's own "button-to-chain challenge".  

The connecting findings I use are modern, but my goal is to use modern findings to enhance and focus on the simple beauty of vintage buttons used in my necklaces....To re-purpose vintage buttons into modern wearable jewelry.



(This applies to vintage lace pieces as well.)
 



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A Big Jar of Old Buttons

     Re purposed Vintage Creations began with a big jar of old buttons.  What to do with them?  I started making jewelry from the buttons.  Well, I am now an official vintage button whore.  I love them. I thoroughly enjoy turning old buttons into something new and wearable once again. Follow my button jewelry-making journey and hopefully I'll inspire you to try your own hand at making   Re purposed Vintage Creations.