Sugar Skulls and Other Inspirations...pt 1

So, as mentioned previously, I thought I'd write about the inspirations behind my current collection of jewellery. It's called Día de los Muertos so there is a big clue in title already about what to expect, but first I think I should go back to the beginning and why I wanted to make it.

When I started to think about what jewellery I wanted to make, my first thought was 'what did I want to wear?' - I wanted to make something that I myself would be happy to wear. Now I'm not a fan of delicate, elegant jewellery - I'm not saying that I don't appreciate a timeless thing of platinum-diamond-infused beauty, but to wear it myself? Well it just isn't me. I like big, bright, colourful, jewellery. I've got a growing collection of Tatty Devine jewellery if you need anymore clues as to the sort of thing I mean. But as wonderful as TD is I still wanted to wear something else, something that I couldn't find in the shops. I wanted something colourful, bright, and cute. But I also wanted it to have an edge - no butterflies and unicorns for me, I like wierd stuff, skulls, demonic teddy bears* and such like. So let's start with the first and biggest inspiration: Día de los Muertos, the Mexican Day of the Dead festival.

The Day of the Dead festival is celebrated on 2 November to remember and pray for deceased friends and relatives. Offerings are made at shrines and usually consist of sugar skulls, flowers, food and drink. DayOfTheDead.com is a really good website to go to if you want more info on the history of the celebration, and contains beautiful pictures in it's 'gallery' section. Since I was a child I've been fascinated by this festival as although it's focused on death it celebrates it in a fun and colourful way. It's about honouring those who have passed on but not in a solemn, gloomy way.

The thing that has always stuck in my mind though are the sugar skulls. They are so bright and colourful; there is so much detail on them. They take what is quite a scary looking object and make it fun and exciting. I wanted to use this element of fun and bright colours, but with a twist in my jewellery.

I now knew that I wanted to incorporate skulls into my designs along with the bright colours of the festival, but Dia de los Muertos wasn't the only thing on my mind when I started to design. In my next post I'll be discussing some of the other inspirations.

*Check out Gloomy Bear, like I said, weird stuff. :)