Not Quite Done - Re-thinking Designs

I've been working on a number of mixed media and assemblage pieces lately and thought I'd go through my steps on two recent ones.

First off, I knew I wanted to use this flower in a necklace. So I glued it to a small brass crescent necklace base with E6000, added some filigree and leaves also, but it was still too plain. First I added some green color to the leaves with alcohol ink, still not quite there.

So I grabbed my Lumiere paint and gave the petals a little dab.

This was better, but I still wasn't thrilled with the total look, so I added a green crystal to the center but it still wasn't working for me. The filigree wasn't set quite right either, so I knew I'd need to cover that up.

Here's what I finally ended up with - added some additional filigree pieces, a couple more flowers. The center is the same little crystal but set in microbeads that are set in crystal clay. I put tiny magenta red cabochons in the flowers to the side and some marquise shaped acrylic gems on the filigree. Now I think its done!

All of the metal pieces for a necklace like this can be found at B'Sue Boutiques. I was fortunate enough to get the small cabochons and the acrylic gems in a free gift bag from B'Sue. If I hadn't gotten them I'd probably have used flatback crystals.

The other piece I've been working on looked this way last week. Many more layers of metal leaves and flowers, a few came already patinaed, with some faux pearls and a purple Lucite flower. Again, it still seemed to be missing something.

This is what I added over the weekend - more filigree, a number of crystals, acrylic gems, and two Swarovski crystal dangles. It's busy, but in this case I think that's the right approach.