Repurposed or Upcycled Costume Jewelry
by Carol Wofford.
(Halifax, VA)
I’ve been wanting to come up with new ways to use up my old inventory of vintage costume jewelry.
I have loved jewelry since I was a child and started collecting at an early age.
I’ve bought from auctions, estate sales, yard sales etc., buying box lots to get the one piece I wanted or just buying it because it was pretty.
As a result I have a huge accumulation of pieces, parts and just stuff.
I started arranging some of the pieces of the same color and came up with a design that I liked.
I removed the earring backs and pin backs and smoothed them off so they would lay flat.
Then I started glueing them on to round filigree connector disks using e6000 glue.
Let the glue dry overnight and connected the disks to each other with small jump rings.
I filled in some of the open spots with whatever I had for small parts and pieces.
I even used some pretty sequins with bead tops.
I glued everything on where I couldn’t use jump rings.
For the chain I braided some beads with leftover chain and connected it with jump rings to additional beads.
I put a toggle clasp on the front side just below the braid which is really comfortable around the back of the neck.
I like the color combination and think I’ll try another color theme soon.
Carol Wofford
