It's All a Process

Sometimes simple is better:

My son and his wife brought me this Mother-of-Pearl spiral pendant from their trip to New Zealand this summer.

My first inclination was to make it a pendant on a string of beads or pearls. I got out all the mother-of-pearl, pearls and dyed pearls, shells, stones and glass beads that I thought might work with the colors in the pendant:

Then I made a bale out of silver wire and a few beads:

while I thought about which pearls and beads to use, and in what way, for the necklace: one strand or two? length? stone and glass, or pearls only? mother-of-pearl, and dyed pearls? I ruminated. But something irritated me about the bale: I thought it might be hard on the pendant. I thought it just might scratch or mar the surface of the Mother-of-Pearl, over time. Also, somehow, the hard wire clashed with the organic softness of the pearl surface and shape.

Then I remembered a necklace that I have, made for me by Mary Spanos several years ago. She wove a fine silk ribbon of her handspun, and wrapped the ribbon around an antique stone spindle whorl:

Simple, effective and beautiful. I wear it often, especially to spinning and weaving venues where someone else might recognize and appreciate the stone whorl.

So, I had a small skein of silk:

Which I then dyed a few colors that seemed "mother-of-pearl" to me:

and warped up a silk ribbon. It was woven on an inkle loom, about 27" long, with white 30's/2 silk as weft.

The finished ribbon was wrapped around the pendant, with a simple knot. I had thought to leave it there, but the mother-of-pearl is not very weighty. To add some heft, I slipped on one silver bead.

There is not even a clasp:

I finished the warps with a twisted fringe, and simply tied the ends.

Sometimes simple is best: