SECOND PAIR OF PROJECT LE CIEL IS DONE!!! i'm very happy with how these came out! it took me about 7-8 hours total to finish. only a few hours less than earring #1, but it felt way quicker... anyway, it was my first time making a pendant like this! i tried to imitate the look of soldered jewelry with resin, gray pigment, and pearlex powder. it doesn't have the same shine, but it still turned out pretty cool!! :D
this pair represents the angel who returns to heaven (labeled angel #1 in the lyric breakdown). the diamond pendant is like an eye, it reflects what the angel sees. the focal point is the foliage of a weeping willow, which represents the angel's lover (labeled angel #2) who has fallen down to earth. i chose a weeping willow because of its various meanings across cultures. grief, love and loss, adaptability, and new life are just a few interpretations. in the background is the night sky - it's like the embrace of angel #1. this also connects to the end of the song. i like to think that they stayed by each other's side from morning, when the sun arose, until the constellations appeared. additionally, the ribbon tears made another appearance! they're white just like the ones on the blue bow earring part of pair #1. i think that's all i had to say about the earrings. thank you for reading!! :]
the main picture at the top is a combination of my horrible edits. here are the rejects:
i'm ready to work on earring #2! this breakdown is a lot neater than the last one because it doesn't have as many odd shapes. hopefully i'll finish the pair before school starts in 4 days...
YEAHHHH FINISHED THE FIRST PAIR OF PROJECT LE CIEL!!!! it took me at least 10 hours to finish! ough i need to start timing myself... those are just the hours i remembered to count -_-;
details are about the same as the last post. the only new thing is the bead above the bow! they're magnetic!!! you can connect the earrings together for funsies or whatever. i just thought it would be fun to play with. anyway, this design is all about connection. to put it simply, i took the symbols of each of the silly angels in my head and mashed them together.
- the left earring features white wings and ribbon "tears", a wilting lily in a dark silver heart, a blue bead and bow, and a dark silver quatrefoil.
- the right earring features gradient white wings and ribbon "tears" (fades to colorless resin), a white lily in a silver heart, a red bead and bow, and a silver quatrefoil.
- the drop length of each earring is a whopping 14.5 cm! i love making big showy earrings ♡
side note: i'd like to make a le ciel zine page when i finish the project, so i'll write formal descriptions and maybe stories for each design later on. ^^
close ups:
FINALLY making an earring. here's my progress so far + a very messy breakdown of each component. i made a lot of changes as i was working, so here's a more accurate list of the details:
the wings, quatrefoil, and curled ribbons are made out of 24 gauge wire.
the heart and the bottom bow (i'll make this last) are made out of 20 gauge wire
the wings only have 2 loops instead of 3. honestly, i made the top loop too small and was too lazy to fix it. i might redo them anyway to match the original sketch. i don't want the wings to be super wide though, so i'm not sure yet.
i made the quatrefoil an entirely different way. i think i folded a long piece of wire in half and made loops. then, i pinched the edges for the petal shape.
help i made the hearts an entirely different way too. i cut the bead wire too short, so i ended up changing every part of that top section. the heart pieces and the flower will be attached to the bead cap now! originally, the flower was supposed to dangle from the top of the heart, but the bottom works too ^^;
instead of twisting the top of the curled ribbons, i'll make a loop with the extra wire.
the stamens are attached the the bead's top loop.
the first week of the project, i broke down the lyrics and never posted the doc. surprise, here's the doc! (sorry if it's lame) i did this to help with the designing process. the pendant designs might make more sense after reading my explanations for lines 3-5... apologies if it ends up making less sense instead. i also want to say that this isn't a strict interpretation of the lyrics. le ciel can paint tons of scenarios and this is just one that i thought of at the time ^^
i think this should bring a little clarity to my project so far. i still want to hold off on the details of my designs until i bring them to life, but reading this might give you a hint at my intentions!
i'll update this continuously! (all rough sketches will be in this post, oldest to newest) sorry they might not make any sense... sometimes i take like 10 minutes to make sense of it myself.
figured out a way to make the heart knots from my sketches!
i was inspired by the view from the plane! i thought they would fit my idea of le ciel well. these pictures are incorporated in the sketches labelled 'night lights' and 'sun ocean sky' in rough sketch #4. they're terrible sketches BUT THE IDEA IS THERE! basically the horizontal pendant is a fallen angel's pov and the vertical pendant is the their lover's pov. i'll go wayy more into detail when i make the earring because i am terrified of telling people my thinking process and i need time and umm thankyou goodnight
sketched four designs so far! i have a few more in mind, but i haven't gotten to them yet. i'll go into depth on the details when the designs are finalized :]
+ the quality sucks but you can open the image in a new tab so it's bigger
edit: i just realized the black lilies are supposed to be white... but dead. so it should be beige-ish with a different colored ribbon. i knew something felt off when i was coloring
I DON'T WANT TO POST MY SKETCHES YET BUT I CAN ASSURE U (though this assurance is mostly for myself) THAT I'VE MADE PROGRESS ON THIS PROJECT.. i'm very excited about it actually. there ended up being too many components for me to be satisfied with creating a single design, so i'll be making SEVERAL!!! so much power.... my first collection since last year maybe. we're so back...
STARTING A NEW PROJECT!!! and writing it here to hold myself accountable...
a few weeks ago i was inspired by the lyrics of le ciel by malice mizer. i'm finally gonna use that inspiration! i'll design an earring that reflects what i envision when i listen to le ciel, along with a few references to malice mizer's details. white lilies and angel wings... that's all i got. i just started brainstorming it, so there's not much to talk about. here are links to the song, the lyrics, an interpretation, and an interview. for research u might say
lyrics: translation 1, translation 2, translation 3, translation 4
interpretation/description of pv
le ciel interview with gackt