Heliotrope Tropical Dahlia Choker - Finished!

Presenting... The Heliotrope Tropical Dahlia choker, now finished!

Finished Necklace

I previously blogged about how I went about exploring this colorway of this design. To connect the individual Tropical Dahlias together, I took a cue from Gwen Fisher's Rivoli Sunflower bracelet and used sterling silver jump rings. I wanted to give an illusion that these beaded flowers were floating on the neck, so I used a minimal number of connecting seed beads between them and the jump rings, and no additional beads for stringing. I think it's a rather minimalist approach, but this rivoli + rizo + drop + rivoli pendant design is so detailed in the first place that they don't need much else to look fabulous.

I wove a total of nine Tropical Dahlias, which is just enough for a choker-length necklace. It's a bit shorter than the length that I usually wear, but if I made it much longer, the Tropical Dahlias wouldn't sit quite right; although the jump rings between them can move freely, the flowers tend to lean forward if they're not sitting right up against the neck. If I had to make this necklace in a longer length, I'd angle the connection bails to balance the piece out.

The jump rings themselves are pretty big, at about 14 mm in diameter. They're closed jump rings, so they should be more resistant to bends than open jump rings. I think I will eventually get a larger clasp for this piece, but a small S-clasp serves as a convenient temporary replacement.

Matching Earrings

Since I have a compulsion to create my jewelry in sets (my bead doctor has officially diagnosed me with "setitis"), I just had to weave a pair of matching earrings.

I had already created other versions of these earrings as part of the Tropical Dahlia Set pattern, but with only the floral component. For this version, I added a Swarovski briolette drop crystal to the bottom of each earring, which really kicks them up to the next level. It's amazing how this technically-simple bead addition adds so much to these earrings!

I'm looking forward to wearing this set at Bead & Button next week! I believe that I shall wear it on Friday :)