Wednesday 23 November 2022

Headpinning

Handmade lampwork glass leaf headpins on copper wire by Laura Sparling

I've been headpinning. At this point I'm in that zone I often find myself in where I keep making the same thing to find out why sometimes the outcome is this and other times that. This is resulting in an enormous amount of headpins. The daft thing is, I don't even know if people want to buy headpins.

Handmade lampwork glass leaf headpins on copper wire by Laura Sparling

Are some of you thinking "What is a headpin anyway?" and wondering what I'm droning on about?

Headpins are not hat pins or hair pins, neither are they finished items of jewellery. Headpins are used by jewellery makers to create pendants, earrings or charms. Beads are threaded onto the wire of a headpin and the glass part acts as a stopper and decorative end. The jewellery maker then finishes the piece with a loop and attaches it to a bail, earwires or whatever other finding they fancy dangling it from.

Handmade lampwork glass leaf headpins on copper wire by Laura Sparling

In most cases I melt the glass straight onto copper wire. Other times I make the glass component on the end of a mandrel and then epoxy in the wire afterwards. This is because some wire doesn't like being in a flame and also because sometimes it is easier to make the glass part on a sturdy mandrel end rather than it bouncing about on the end of a wire while you try and shape it. For example, my acorns and oak leaves are headpins; the acorns have their wires (copper with an antique bronze coating that cannot go in a flame) glued in after and the oak leaves are made directly on pure copper wire which I make darker with patination afterwards.

Handmade lampwork glass leaf headpins on copper wire by Laura Sparling

As you can see, I've been making a lot of leaf headpins. There's something very pleasing about the shape; it's very tactile, transparent ones catch the light beautifully and they would make great earrings.

Brass leaf mashers for lampwork from LampworkTool

For the leaves pictured throughout this post I've been using a set of mashers which I bought from LampworkTool on Etsy.

Brass leaf mashers for lampwork from LampworkTool

They're really good mashers and I highly recommend them.

I've also been experimenting with making hollow headpins.

Handmade hollow lampwork glass headpins on copper wire by Laura Sparling

These are quite tricky but it's ever so rewarding when they turn out well. 

Handmade hollow lampwork glass headpins on copper wire by Laura Sparling

These hollow ones would be perfect for earrings as they are nice and light.

Right now there are some green leaf headpin pairs in my shop and this weekend I'm going to sort out the big pile of assorted headpins that I've gathered over the past week or so and put some mixes of them in the shop too.

I'm feeling a bit lost with the glass right now, to be honest. I'm just making what I feel like making. I've totally given up trying to predict what people might like or what they want. And when I do make what people have asked me to make ("Damn, I missed them, please make more!" etc) the stuff just ends up sitting there. So yep, I'm making what I want to make and if someone wants to buy it, then bonus.

Do I sound like a glass grump? That'll be because I'm being a bit of a glass grump. It'll pass. *sigh*

2 comments:

  1. Your headpins make me want to start making jewellery again!

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    Replies
    1. I’m keep wanting to turn them into stuff myself! It’s very tempting how they’re just a couple of twists and loops away from being wearable.

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