Project Runway: Season 8: Episode 1: "And Sew it Begins!"

Episode 1: "And Sew it Begins!"
Air: 7.29.10
My Lifetime, Thursdays, 9pm PST.

The Project Runway Challenge: The designers had to use a garment from another designer's suitcase to create a new look.
For our EtsyMetal Translation: for this challenge we traded scraps and randomly drew names, then we mailed our scraps to another team member and then they created a new fabulous piece of jewelry from it!

Please see all the amazingly fun transformations below!

Nina Gibson's scrap - Andrea Ring creates

Nina says, "I tried to pick out some interesting bits. I didn't clean anything. The mess of wire is fine silver and the bezel wire, but everything else is sterling."

Andrea says, "Using scraps from Nina. I even used the the little nest of fine silver by balling it up for his nose. This piece is titled "Roger Goes To The Circus". I'm so excited to see what everyone else did,this was great fun!"

Stacey Hansen's scraps - Nina Gibson creates

Nina says, "I used one of her cute enamel mini earrings and the small wide band, I added a stamped silver top and a little blue enamel disc to make the earring stand out. I wanted to use more of the earrings, but ran out of time. This was a fun challenge!"

Andrea Ring's scraps - Kira Ferrer creates

Andrea says, "I've had this piece around for quite some time, was one of the first things I did after getting my hydraulic press. (nickel and copper,sterling rivet) The web pieces are sterling and I just had to throw in some street sign!"

Kira says, "Andrea sent me a great collection of scrap including some green aluminum sign. Sawing and filing the sign was fun. So lightweight and a lot softer than the other metals. And, the paint really holds up, doesn't chip off when you file the edges."

Victoria's scraps - Stacey creates

Victoria says, "I tend to take handfuls of my clean scrap and melt them in piles. Why you ask? Because its fun to melt things and it also keeps it easier to save in chunks for refining or casting. And besides, sometimes you can get interesting blobs!" 

Stacey says, "when i got experimetal's scraps, i really liked them just the way they were. they made me think of lunarscapes or meteorites. i chose to make a ring with a couple of tube set garnets as accents."

Kira's scraps - Victoria creates

Kira says, "Pieces of sterling silver water castings and some scraps of an abandoned project. The water castings are about 1/2" across. The triangles are about 1 1/2" long."

(me) Victoria says, "Oh I had a hard start with these, I put it off so long thats why this blog post is so late, and I realllly apologize for this!  The day before they were due I just sat myself down and started hammering on the water castings, I was gonna just see what happened as I went along. I then ran them through the rolling mill, I felt like, worse case scenario I would melt them down and cast them into something new, my back up plan! I kept going and then I began to see beautiful patterns in the flattened buttons of silver and then it metamorphasized into what you see above, you can see the back side cutout patterns here. The two pair of earrings I decided to have funfunfun with, I just saw the "Oh my God it's a Double Rainbow" video on youtube. And I cannot stop cracking up, I wanted to use all her scrap so I just had to carve out some little rainbows from them, and here they are :D hee hee, I hope you watch the video link, it takes a bit to load but its worth it if you want a good laugh! Supposedly no drugs were involved in the video, he was just having a very very special moment!

 I want to share a bit, I just want to add that all these EtsyMetal jewelry challenges are a great exploration tool and technique that I do not use enough on my own accord, but when it works you usually can discover something new about your process which then can turn into something truly and fully gratifying, which luckily in this case this has happened for me. Kira's scrap made me explore something I would never of predesigned in my mind and executed, she gave me a reason to play and explore, thanks EM team & Kira!

NEXT weeks Episode 2: "Larger than Life!"

*see My Lifetime VIDEO here.

The Project Runway Challenge: The designers were asked to create a look that defines the Marie Claire woman. The winning look will be featured on a "billboard" in Times Square.

The EtsyMetal Translation: To make a mini billboard, use a base of 1 x 2" inches of any material and build your piece on or around this rectangle shape!

See you next week! Thanks for reading our team blog, hope you enjoyed it!