Friday Pick - Gunmetal & Swarovski

The picture above shows items from recent on-line purchases from (top) Fusion Beads, (left) Dry Gulch and (right) Rings & Things. The "chain" stretching diagonally between the Dry Gulch and Rings & Things items is an experiment I'm working on, made with gunmetal hooks and split rings from Rings & Things. I think it's going to go well with some of my Steampunk style ideas.

I really love to design with gunmetal. I've been building up a stash of stuff so I'll have what I need when the inspiration hits to make something. When I was writing last Saturday's Supplier Sales post, I came across some really great deals at Dry Gulch using their (now expired) 30% off coupon and was able to get a lot more of the great gunmetal findings they stock than I would have otherwise.

I'm particularly happy with the eyeglass holders, the cone ends and the twisted flat bar links. The big double chain circle pendant piece has me thinking of a number of designs. One which will feature it in a Steampunk type necklace, should show up here on my blog soon. The other pieces shown are cord ends, crimps, crimp covers in two sizes and wire guardians - I'm so happy to have wire guardians that don't detract from the look of a gunmetal piece like silver ones do.

Also shown are some gunmetal purchases made recently from Rings & Things. I'm restocking some items and trying out a few new ones. I got a few magnetic clasps to try out, a number of folding clasps, some hammered links and a couple three to one hole connectors to play with, too, in addition to more hook & figure 8 loop clasps, since I use both of those pieces for other purposes as well.

Finally, I went looking via Google for the gold-filled 3 strand sliding clasps that I need to finish off a couple new bracelets, and found them at what I thought was a very good price at Fusion Beads. They also seemed to have pretty good Swarovski pricing, so I picked out a number of colors I thought I'd use for fall and winter designs. I'm really fond of the Crystal Copper and Pacific Opal colors, but all of them are wonderful.

That's it for the Friday Pick. Tomorrow I'll share another list of the Supplier Sales I've gotten wind of that you might want to get in on before they run out. See you then!