Renewal
A pretty shade of cornflower blue is the dominant colour of this 70 cm long necklace of oval-shaped agate beads punctuated by varieties of Balinese silver beads. For more info on the necklace, please click on Details, and if interested in my musings, please go to Story.
The identification of the beads starts from the bead in the centre, moving upwards, with measurement for some of the bigger beads, with metal beads named last.
Length: 70 cm (27.5”)
Weight: 89 gm
Blue agate pieces about 15 mm long, and 10 to 11 mm across
2.5 mm silver spacers, small, granulated silver discs, small grooved bicones, rectangular silver tablets (about 11 by 9 mm across), 10.5 mm round granulated silver beads, and 4 silver rings.
Gold filled crimp tubes
Silver toggle clasp
Silver Manik identity disc
I've had this string of blue agate for a very long time now. They came from Mr L who had bought it in Camden market in London.
Agates are quite often dyed and/or heat-treated for enhancement (though there are natural agate too) and this is acceptable in the trade. How good the treatment is, shows up in the final colour of the stones and how long the colour stays.
I really liked the string of blue agate; it had clearly been well treated, so that the colour was a soothing shade of cornflower blue, evenly so throughout all the beads, and remained the same blue after so many years (they were already 'old' when they came into my possession, and I've had them in my possession for close to twenty years now).
That said, this was one of those beads which I found challenging to work with. The design problem for me was, what other stones do I design them with, given how relatively small sized they are? Bigger stones would just overwhelm them. I tried with different stones in smaller sizes, but none really appealed. And then, more recently, I realise that I should forget about adding in other stones; I should show them off on their own but brightened up with small silver beads instead. And so I did just that, trying out different smaller silver beads in my collection, finally settling on five different types of silver spacers, discs and tablets. The ensemble came together delightfully, giving new life to the cornflower blue agate.
I am calling this necklace Renewal. This elegant necklace goes well with more muted shades of of-white, beige, lemony yellow, but would also work with a grey-blue. It went well too against a wine-red dress. Enjoy!
