February 21st, 2007 at 9:31 pm
Personal touches, key ideas to make your jewellery stand out
As I look through hundreds of jewellery makers websites, it doesn’t seem often that I think “wow, how unusual!”, or as a maker myself; think ‘I want to buy that.’ I think the ultimate test is getting a fellow jewellery maker to want to buy a piece of your jewellery!
So here I have compiled a list of things that caught my attention and made me bookmark their page to check in regularly to see what they were up to:
1 ) A bit of personality. Both on the website and within the jewellery. Some quirkiness always attracts my attention. It might be a line of jewellery for cat lovers that features little sterling silver cats nestled amongst chunky gemstones. This kind of thing is cool.
2 ) A personal touch. I love tags with the designers name or symbol on, it really shows off the piece to be as exclusive as it is. Customers love one of a kind pieces.
3 ) Taste. I know this is an entirely personal thing and hard to define. However there are certain boundaries that won’t do a jewellery designer any harm to consider. An example is a site I visited that featured a sparkly animated fairy along with a weaved crocodile bracelet made out of plastic beads. This is great for the kids, don’t get me wrong but this had a shopping cart and I don’t know many web surfing, credit card bearing children at the moment (horrible thought!)
4 ) Unusual findings. Classic findings are great for jewellery making but I found a site where a very talented designer had created her own box clasps, using the magical silver clay (use the link to see Jennifer’s tutorial within her blog) Fabulous! She could have just added it to a simple strand of pearls and that would have looked something special. Another idea is to create s-clasps from wire, quite unusual also. I have attempted silver clay toggles, which came out quite well, very rustic looking. Silver clay has the added bonus of being 99.9% pure silver.
5 ) Professional website. Clean, crisp sites with a beautiful scheme of complimentary colours and an art gallery modern feel always make jewellery look even better and professional than it already is. It’s not too hard to achieve this, there’s plenty of templates out there that look like this where you can personalize them to look special.
6 ) Photography. The most imporatant thing to making jewellery stand out on a website is the quality of photographs. Crisp, close-up shots look wonderful on a white background. Photographs really make or break a website. Invest in a digital camera with a good macro mode, will be well worth it.
7 ) Unusual beads. You see jewellery made up of one strand of rose quartz rounds. Lovely, but it’s been done before, it won’t make you stand out. Either keep the rounds and make an unusual clasp or get some natural, ragged chunks of smokey quartz. Searching for unusual beads is great. Try eBay.
8 ) New Techniques. When a jewellery designer I like adds a new item that has been made using a completely different technique to their other pieces I am always impressed. After all the more variety you have on offer, the more chance of finding a customer!
So here I have compiled a list of things that caught my attention and made me bookmark their page to check in regularly to see what they were up to:
1 ) A bit of personality. Both on the website and within the jewellery. Some quirkiness always attracts my attention. It might be a line of jewellery for cat lovers that features little sterling silver cats nestled amongst chunky gemstones. This kind of thing is cool.
2 ) A personal touch. I love tags with the designers name or symbol on, it really shows off the piece to be as exclusive as it is. Customers love one of a kind pieces.
3 ) Taste. I know this is an entirely personal thing and hard to define. However there are certain boundaries that won’t do a jewellery designer any harm to consider. An example is a site I visited that featured a sparkly animated fairy along with a weaved crocodile bracelet made out of plastic beads. This is great for the kids, don’t get me wrong but this had a shopping cart and I don’t know many web surfing, credit card bearing children at the moment (horrible thought!)
4 ) Unusual findings. Classic findings are great for jewellery making but I found a site where a very talented designer had created her own box clasps, using the magical silver clay (use the link to see Jennifer’s tutorial within her blog) Fabulous! She could have just added it to a simple strand of pearls and that would have looked something special. Another idea is to create s-clasps from wire, quite unusual also. I have attempted silver clay toggles, which came out quite well, very rustic looking. Silver clay has the added bonus of being 99.9% pure silver.
5 ) Professional website. Clean, crisp sites with a beautiful scheme of complimentary colours and an art gallery modern feel always make jewellery look even better and professional than it already is. It’s not too hard to achieve this, there’s plenty of templates out there that look like this where you can personalize them to look special.
6 ) Photography. The most imporatant thing to making jewellery stand out on a website is the quality of photographs. Crisp, close-up shots look wonderful on a white background. Photographs really make or break a website. Invest in a digital camera with a good macro mode, will be well worth it.
7 ) Unusual beads. You see jewellery made up of one strand of rose quartz rounds. Lovely, but it’s been done before, it won’t make you stand out. Either keep the rounds and make an unusual clasp or get some natural, ragged chunks of smokey quartz. Searching for unusual beads is great. Try eBay.
8 ) New Techniques. When a jewellery designer I like adds a new item that has been made using a completely different technique to their other pieces I am always impressed. After all the more variety you have on offer, the more chance of finding a customer!
This entry was posted on Wednesday, February 21st, 2007 at 9:31 pm and is filed under Articles.
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Very impressed! Far more detailed that I thought and you look so glamorous! The design of the blog and the pictures are great.
February 26th, 2007 at 9:27 amAlso, your text reveals your enthusiasm for the subject and detailed research.
10/10 !
HI Kate,
I’m researching ‘jewellery making’ for a (fiction)book I’m currently working on and loved your website - especially your enthusiasm which stands out a mile. Thanks for this.
kind regards
May 1st, 2007 at 4:51 pmGiselle
Hi,
I just wanted to say thanks for the great info. I was searching sites for information for my wife (she has just started making Earrings) and was looking for pointers / tips.
You have a great site and I just wanted to take the time to wish you all the best with you career.
Tony
May 16th, 2007 at 2:18 pmthanks for all of the invaluable information! lisa
April 14th, 2008 at 6:16 pmHi-
October 22nd, 2008 at 2:40 pmI like your tips and advice very much, and I do look on ebay for items.However I also trawl bootsales for unusual or old items to bring home and reuse to my own design. If appropriate, I put them in the dishwasher and they come out sparkling clean [not good for everything, though]I also dismantle bead lampshades , placemats etc for the large amount of beads I get very cheaply to re-use.
Lovely site-thanks from Isabel Adams
Thanks for the great info.
Keep it up!
December 7th, 2009 at 11:09 pmI keep listening towards the news speak about getting free of charge on the net grant software so I have been seeking around to the finest web site to get a single.
April 26th, 2010 at 12:58 amHm, Now i am happy with this but nevertheless not absolutely confident, so i am about to research even more.
April 7th, 2011 at 11:59 pm