Two Moon Pendants from Blizzard Conditions; blog; Melasdesign; jewelry designer; metal clay; copper; crescent moon pendants; abstract art

Two Moon Pendants from Blizzard Conditions

The past 3 weeks in Tucker County, West Virginia have seen blizzard conditions bringing the best skiing anyone can remember and lots of quiet time indoors for folks like me who wouldn’t dare try the sport. Near the Winter Solstice (Yule) I photographed the cold moon for a new digital artwork (see below). January’s Wolf Moon found me making copper clay crescent moon pendants.

Cold Moon Solstice Meditation

I’ve begun to approach metal clay jewelry design more and more sculpturally. I’m getting away from starting with a stamped form to as a basis. My recent work with ceramic clay has awakened in me a more tactile method of using metal clay. I decided to further develop my basic moon pendants from the basic swoosh shape to something more shapely and detailed.

Freeform Knobby Moon Pendant Copper; view 1

For the Freeform Knobby Crescent Moon Pendant, I made a crescent shape while twisting the clay. The twist added a nice effect, but I wanted something even more segmented and knobby. As the clay dried, I shaped and carved the clay, working all the way until I was carving greenware. I did my best not to let the resulting moon look like pastry! Refining this required time consuming filing and shaping until the piece was formed to my liking. 

Freeform Knobby Crescent Moon Pendant; view 2

Making the Man in Moon Star Pendant in Copper with Cultured Opal was much more complicated. My aim was to make a crescent moon with anthropomorphic face, trailed by a single star. It was a learning experience with a drastic reduction in clay mass from carving.

Man in Moon pendant work in progress - freshly carved copper metal clay greenware

I used both an additive and subtractive sculpting method for the face, so it was nestled comfortably into the curve of the crescent. 

Man in Moon Star Copper Pendant

As it ended up, the opposite side of the moon look bored and lonely, so I decided to mount the pendant with a cultured opal. Cultured opals are a sustainable, cruelty free way to have the color shifting beauty of opals in jewelry. This opal shows deep red with flashes of green and blue.

Man in moon pendant wip stone side
This particular type of cultured opal from Healing Phoenix Lapidary is great to use with metal clay, because it can be fired in place on the metal clay greenware as part of the normal firing process. I’ve been much happier using these cultured opals than with my old standby cubic zirconias, which have a tendency to easily lose color during firing.
Finish fired and polished copper crescent moon pendant with cultured opal

The final step was adding a small star charm. In keeping with having both sides functional as “the front,” both sides of the star are decorated. One side has an inlaid stroke, while the other has as starburst texture.

Thanks for reading about my copper moon pendants! These pieces are on of a kind, but I assure you there are many more moons to come! 

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