The Inspiration and Design Process

    I get asked quite often, "how do you come up with your design ideas?" Well that can be a very complicated question, since I get them from so many places.  You can get design ideas just from getting out and seeing the world around you with a different perspective, visit a museum of any sort and look at the natural world with a quiet mind. You will be amazed at how suddenly you see how the vine of a grape trellis gently winds around the frame, how the colors of a birds feathers combined into something magnificent, and how the sound of a child's laughter creates a chime like music. All these things can be somehow incorporate into your own designs.

​    Of course you can also look at other artist's work to be inspired. Never to duplicate, but to be inspired by their creative visions. I especially like to look at work that is not even jewelry,  it makes me think in a different way about my own process and how I can use other techniques. Surrounding yourself with other artist of many mediums is a wonderful inspiration. I am lucky enough to have a large group of artist friends and I belong to a couple different groups in and out of my field or art. 

    Now if we are talking about the knitty gritty of the design itself, that is a process I do in three different ways. Yes three, because each one has it's own pro's and cons. What may work for one wire wrap design may not work at all for another. I also try to keep an open mind if none of these processes works for me.

    If a stone/shell is very unique, I may see right away in my head how I want to wrapped it. The longer I have been doing my art the more often this happens to me. Some people explain this by saying "the stone speaks to me."  In a way I suppose that is true and it certainly sounds beautiful. I do admit there has been a few times were this process surprised me with such a sudden design idea popping into my head upon picking up a stone, that it felt somehow mystical. But really I think your eye and brain become trained after so many years of working that you just see the best design quickly in some instances, especially if you know the person you are creating it for personally.

     Other times it may take me a very long time to see how to wrap a stone.   In this case, I will trace the stone on paper in many different angles and then doodle till I get something I find pleasing. This is usually the style I use for custom orders simply because the customer then can choose the design they prefer and it make us both happy in the end. It also opens up my creativity to try different angles of positioning the stone. I may end up with something completely different then what I was originally thinking. I always keep these sketches too, because you never know if a design will work even better for a different stone in the future. I also like to use them more as a reference while creating the actual design, because once you get started you may find that a design looks somewhat different in reality than on the paper. Bumps and variations in a stone are hard to incorporate until you begin actual wrapping of the piece. 

     Another process is to sometimes just pick a stone and some wire up and let my hands do what ever they feel. It is a more free type of work and can be quite liberating, as long as I am in the best mood for it. It can bring about a truly unique design. But on the other hand it can produce a real frustration and headache if my brain isn't free enough that particular day. It makes me work outside my comfort zone, and that is a good thing to do once in a while to expand your art and your mind.


   

Inspiration and process get together in the artistic mind.