The (Slowly Emerging) Debut of "Barefoot & Bipolar Designs"

“Barefoot & Bipolar Designs” 
A Reasonably Happy Subsidiary of Morse Code Jewelry
I’ve been toying with this idea for years… NON-morse code jewelry.  But I didn’t want to do it unless it had something truly unique to offer.  I think I’ve come upon a few ideas.  That’s not to say that I won’t make jewelry just because it’s beautiful, but I wanted the debut to involve something special.  
Nothing is officially for sale yet, as mcj’s website needs to be retrofitted to accommodate online purchases (there will also be a morse code jewelry outlet there for pieces that need a home!) but I thought I’d post these pictures to whet your appetite.
Below is a 1.5 inch diameter pendant, with a sterling silver bail (mounted on frosted acrylic just for photography) that features an antique postcard image of Minot Light in Scituate, MA (Cohasset likes to make a fuss that Minot Light belongs to them, but that’s jive… 😉
The glass is jeweler’s grade mineral crystal, and it is sealed and sanded into the back of the glass via hand-casting with resin. 
It is a genuine postcard, and you can see the aging of the paper both front and back, which is linen-based.  As I write this the date of the card is in another room, but if I had to guess from the comfort of my couch, I think I remember it being circa 1912.
From what I understand from the lady who sold me the postcard, I might cause quite a dustup with hard-core postcard collectors by “destroying” it the way I did… Sorry ’bout that, gang.
Next to come will be sand, yes, literally sand, enclosed in glass pendants from local beaches.  It will be “loose” under a low-domed piece of glass.  I’ve had several stops and starts getting this one right.  You wouldn’t think it would be hard to sandwich a little sand in between a couple of pieces of glass, but it can get messy pretty quick if you don’t have a steady hand.  Nothing a little quake-gel and sponge q-tips won’t fix, though…  Yeah, I know.  What the heck am I talking about… I’m not entirely sure either, but that’s the solution that’s workable right now to get it done.  It may become more Rube Goldberg as I go.  Who knows.
In the meantime, keep watching the blog and twitter and www.mcjusa.com for more updates and announcements!

Wanna see what one of my clients ordered?

This is is a custom order for a client through one my my jewelers, but it was so pretty, I thought I’d share.  She asked for something “red, white, and black” with a particular set of letters (don’t see a reason to share that!) The sparkly silver is a new new “kind” of silver, Argentium, which has an alloy called Germanium in it which makes it virtually tarnish resistant.  It’s much more expensive than .925 sterling silver, but for this finish, it’s worth every penny, since traditional silver is essentially un-polishable in the laser-cut “sugar-coat” finish.  It never, ever, looks right once it tarnishes, so these are a real find!  They actually look a lot like white gold, because the color of Argentium silver is “whiter” than traditional silver. If you look closely, there’a a vibrant rainbow beaming off of them!  I’m sure the client will appreciate it once she gets it out into the sunshine.

Afghanistan calls…


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If you haven’t met Ingrid & Patrick, they are the Navy/Marine couple that became engaged using morse code jewelry’s “Marry me” bracelet. Click here if you missed it. Below is an email I just received from Patrick. They had hoped to marry in the fall of 2010 unless Ingrid got called up to serve in Afghanistan.

The call came.



Here’s his unedited email:

Annie,


Some bad news….

Ingrid got a call last Tuesday morning from her command at her hospital. She has orders to augment an Army medical unit in Kandahar, Afghanistan. The US Navy often sends their personnel as Individual Augmentees (IAs) to Army or Marine Corps units engaged in the Global War on Terrorism in both Iraq and Afghanistan. She’ll start a month of training in January and then deploy for about 6 months as nurse a trauma hospital in Kandahar. It’s pretty intense work, but Ingrid has experience with traumatic cases working in the OIF/OEF ward on the east coast. This will just be a different part experience as she cares for soldiers and Marines a bit earlier in their road to recovery.

We have to delay our wedding a bit and push it back to January 2011 instead of October 2010. This will be a bit of a role reversal as I’ll be home in California and Ingrid will be deployed to a combat zone. Ingrid has made it through 2 of my deployments, so making it through one of hers shouldn’t be that bad.

Just thought we’d keep you updated. Ingrid’s going to keep the bracelet on through this deployment too. It fits over her latex gloves well…her engagement ring might stay home for the deployment though.