Repurposed Jewelry from New Items

Not far from where I work, there's an awesome little store that sells unusual discount jewelry. I love to wander around and visually take in all of the items. I'm not like the standard customer that shops there. I have no intention of buying the jewelry to wear right off of the rack. Rather, I like to scope out the bracelets, necklaces and earrings for unique materials that I can use in my own jewelry creations. When there, I feel like a kid in a candy store. I make my purchases and am giddy with anticipation at the thought of disassembling the jewelry and making them into my own one-of-a-kind creations.

From this store, I picked up several different colors of this lace filigree necklace:
I took them apart to form individual pieces. I also removed the glass rhinestone from the center of each piece. (I will use these in another project.) These filigree pieces are unusual enough where you don't see them all over the internet; they look great as a background for an image or as a base for collage/mixed media jewelry.


This is a piece that I have started to make using one piece of the disassembled necklace. I will probably add some beading around the image and make it into a bracelet:



Using the same ideology, I recently made this one-of-a-kind necklace using parts of 2 necklaces and some chain from my collection of jewelry findings:

I always like to recreate things into something different. I think I was into "altered art" before the term was ever coined. I want to inspire you to think outside of the box. By using a little creativity, you can make designs that are completely your own without spending an arm and a leg to do it. Happy creating!