We have received lots of requests to be able to make a square dragonscale with both rings the same gauge, and other than 20g. So with that we have made 18-M rings. Copper and stainless steel are already up in the store. Bronze and red brass will follow shortly.
We have also made a new size…..”N” Also up in the store in copper and stainless 18 gauge, with others to follow. This is the large ring we used to make the Viper basket below. (with a 18-G small ring)
Viper Basket
Last Saturday marked another fundraiser for the Rocky Mountain Riot, the local co-ed banked roller derby team. Delia Doom, one of the team members ordered a chainmaille bikini top, epilates, and D ring chain to accent a corset she recently bought. She wore it for the first time at this event.
The bikini top was made by me from 16g 5/16 BA and EPDM, using a traditional European 6-1 wave. Shoulder epilates were created by Curt and I using scales and accenting spikes. While the chain connecting the two D rings on the corset was made with a Celtic visions weave in square stainless 16-K and 18-G by Curt
The entire outfit looked incredible together, she truly fit the part of a roller derby gal.
(Click pictures for larger version)
Here is a close up of the epilates.
Make sure to also check out their team site at http://www.rockymountainriot.com/
I’ve got a name!
First, thanks to everybody who participated in our “I need a name” contest. We had a lot of great suggestions and there were a number of them that stood out to me, but I decided to go with “Acute Helm” as was suggested by Christy. I’m still not sure what I will call the variant, but we are tossing around ideas here.
There was also another suggestion that as soon as I saw it I knew it was perfect for the other new weave that I mentioned but didn’t post a picture of.
You can see it has a very wavy look to it. I had in my head that I wanted to name it something to do with water, so Jill’s suggestion of Hydroglyph just seemed perfect to me.
Christy and Jill I will contact you shortly to see which one you would like.
For everybody else who was interested in the original pattern, tutorials (both hardcopy and downloadable) are up in the store. BA/AA and Argentium and niobium kits should be up by tomorrow.
Remember, It’s In the Maille!
Last week I was playing with a pattern I had in my head and I ended up with something not quite what I was looking for, but I also ended up with a new weave. Well, two weaves actually and a variant, but we’ll get to that later.
I’ve never been good at naming things so I asked for some suggestions here at the shop and didn’t get anything, so now I come to you. Here are a few pictures of it first. (click on the picture for larger version)
BA 16g 11/32 and 18g 7/32
18-K and 20-C square wire
18-K argentium and 19g 3.50mm niobium
18-K argentium and 19g 3.50mm niobium
And a quick one of the variant.
18-K and 20-C square wire
So, I need a name for this and I am asking for your help, and to make it fun I’ll make it a give away.
Here are the details:
Leave a comment here with your suggestion.
One suggestion per comment.
Leave as many comments as you like.
Next Friday, (July 30th) I will pick the name I like best.
If I pick your suggestion, I will send you a kit with instructions to make your own. (so be sure to leave a way for me to contact you)
It’s just that simple.
Remember, It’s in the Maille!
We are always playing with our square wire rings to find more uses for them and pass that information on to you. So today is the first of the updates.
Japanese Bulls eye is a pattern by our friend Rebeca over at Blue Buddha Boutique. I have always liked this pattern, and have come up with sizes in our square rings that will work for it.
These will use 16-K, 18-I and 20-C square rings. You can also find kits for them in our shop here.
I have also confirmed that using 16-K, 18-K and 20-K rings will give you a nice graduated full persian pattern that looks great as an earring or pendant.
I have also confirmed that a 20-M argentium square ring used in combination with a 20g 1/8″ niobium ring makes a wonderful dragonscale. The shine of the colors bouncing off the argentium is amazing.
Inspired by a customer who sent us a picture of one she had done, Jenn put together a dragontail bracelet that uses 18-K square argentium and 18g 5/32″ niobium. We also have a kit for this bracelet here.
We will get all of these added to our square wire weave chart very soon.
We have been busy upgrading the website. You will see many new changes to the site as compared to the old site. There are some minor cosmetic changes, but we have also consolidated many ring listings to make shopping much easier. If you haven’t been to our site before, some of the categories were a little disorganized. Now, they are much more organized and I for one am liking the way everything seems to flow. You will find it is much more convenient to shop than ever before!
New rings, wait, don’t leave yet! I haven’t told you what rings. Are you ready? We have added Argentium silver and 14K Gold Filled rings. While we do have limited sizes right now, rest assured we are hard at work cutting more. We have also added several sizes of 18g Niobium rings. While we are on the subject of Niobium, you will notice that we have all of our 20g back in stock and decided that while we were making rings we would add a couple of new sizes.
We have also added a number of new sizes in base metals, and we will continue to do so as we get them made.
Over the course of the next few days, we will be putting some rings on clearance including Sterling silver, as we have decided to only make Argentium.
While we have fully tested the new store, I’ve never claimed to be perfect. If you find something out of place, let us know so we can get it taken care of.
We hope you like the new look and layout and welcome any comments/suggestions you may have.
And remember,It’s in the Maille.
I got an email today from a customer who wanted to show us what she made with our jump rings. I was blown away when I saw the pictures. Not only is this a very original idea, but it is very cool in my opinion. I have had the pleasure of seeing one of her all chainmaille purses in person and have to say she does some great work. If you want a chainmaille purse, from ordinary, to something one of a kind, drop her a note and see what she can come up with for you. You can find her etsy shop here.
And remember, It’s in the Maille!
As I mentioned in our last entry, we have some big news coming up here at C&T. Well, it stacking up as more was finalized today. We have a couple more things to take care of, then we will start the announcements. Have I peaked your curiosity yet?
In other events of the day, I thought I’d do something I have not actively done here before, and that’s feature another artist. Sure, we have our little favorites off to the right here, but let look at something bigger. I hope to do a couple of these a month, and they will always feature somebody who I think has done something outstanding with our rings.
Lets start out with Jessica over at RedPanda. If you have never seen her stuff, go have a look. Lots of colors, lots of “stretch” designs, not to mention, what I call, Big and Bold.
We have custom made jump rings for her on several occasions, but when she posted these earrings tonight, well, it’s one of those things that make you go wow.
Not only is this a really cool design in my opinion, you have to understand just how tiny these rings are. They are 22g, sized just for JPL, which makes them some of the smallest 22g a chainmailler would use. They were loads of fun to make for her.
Anyway, go have a look at her shop, and all the cool stuff she has.
Remember, It’s in the Maille!
A lot of you have been asking for new/different square wire rings in different metals and sizes. Well, we posted a new 18g stainless ring for Byzantine on Monday. We didn’t get a chance to post it here, but wrote about it on twitter. We thought the couple of pounds we had made were plenty for a while, turns out we were wrong. If you don’t already follow us on twitter, you can follow us and get the latest breaking designs from us there. Just follow @candtdesigns. For those that missed out on these and still want some, we should have more made next week.
Because of this, we have held off posting another new ring we have. 18g argentium square also for Byzantine. We wanted to make some more so we didn’t run out quite so quick. We will have those posted later tonight.
Also just in today is 16g AWG square red brass. We will be developing ring sizes with it over the next few days, and you can expect them to be posted next week. Again, we will tweet it, so watch for us.
For those that have been asking for a 3rd, non silver or gold metal, to mix with the copper and red brass, we have confirmation that our nickel silver has shipped. We expect to have those done next week as well. Those that have asked to be notified when they are ready, we will send you an email as soon as we have them cut.
If you are looking for a specific size for your design, please contact us and we would be happy to see what we can do for you.
Remember, It’s in the Maille!
In addition to our website here, we also sell on Artfire. Recently there was a pendant swap that was organized by cctexan that we participated in. Basically a bunch or artists sent her pendants, she swapped them around and sent the pendants back out. For every one you sent in, you got one back. We received our pendants today, and I have to say there is some great work here. Here is what we got.
White marble cabochon with seed beads
A wonderful piece that obviously has a lot of time involved in it. That’s a lot of beads!
Silver art clay leaf pendant with stone
I love the stone that is in this. I don’t know what it is, but it is a beautiful shade of dark blue. One day I will get to play with art clay.
Purple crazy lace agate wrapped with copper
The purple in this stone is wonderful, and the lines just really pop. Good thing I got some new copper wire in today so I can make a matching chain.
Now I just have to figure out how to use these in one of our designs.
We’d like to thank cctexan for putting this together, and all the wonderful artists who participated and made this a great experience.
If you are looking for a wonderful handmade pendant, I highly suggest you take a look at these wonderful artists.
