Day 22- The Roving Necklace

3/22/14

Tonight's project was simple and very different in its style from many others I've done recently. I played around with some large glass beads to make some really interesting components, but everything I tried to make with them became extremely heavy and so nothing really worked. But I still love them. Hopefully I'll be able to use them on something one day.

The blue glass beads, wrapped with laceweight alpaca yarn and embellished with a vintage crystal.

I started my final piece with some alpaca roving, carefully braiding it. Roving is carded unspun fiber, so it's very delicate and pulls apart easily. I braided two black pieces and a white piece to give a stark pattern to the braid.

I tied up the ends of the braid with a mustard yellow yarn and wrapped almost 2 inches on each side. I really love the yellow tone here, but a metallic thread would have been interesting as well.

Next I crocheted a circle from both the mustard colored yarn and a felted off white yarn. I stitched in an amber colored bead to the top and sewed them all together. The necklace opens with a hook and eye underneath the circles.

Necklace: Alpaca Roving, Wool Yarn, Acrylic Yarn, Plastic Bead
(Strangely resembling a citrus fruit...)

I love the look of the braided roving and have plenty more so this might go into another piece. It would be really beautiful sewn in rows or woven into fabric. Braiding something metallic in with the roving would add a little bit of sparkle as well.

xo,
Arielle