No Shades of Gray

I kept telling myself that I just wouldn't have time to submit an entry to this month's EBW Challenge, Complimentary Contradictions.  After all, I moved across the country mid-month (I miss New Mexico!), have a wedding dress that I need to finish for a week from Sunday (not to mention a bridesmaid dress that needs SERIOUS altering...), and will be starting grad school on Tuesday.  

However, this week I decided that I just needed to enter a piece!  While my original ideas had all been about fairly elaborate necklaces, I decided to go with the same themes and create a bracelet instead.

The theme was Complimentary Contradictions.  What, I thought, is more contradictory than opposites?  And what is more opposite than black and white?  For the sake of elegance, I decided to go with silver beads instead of white, but I think you can forgive that. ;)  My next thought was about the contrast in a very structured stitch vs. freeform.  I loved the way the freeform 'bubbles' looked on peyote cuffs (as in my 'sea and fire' and 'fire and sea' cuffs), so I knew how complimentary those contradictions can be!

Thus, 'No Shades of Gray' was born.  I debated for a time between my matte and glossy black beads, and finally decided to use both.  My initial plan was to do a checkerboard, but as I began the 3-drop peyote, the alternating lines just looked so sleek, that I ended up making alternating columns of matte and glossy instead of the checkerboard pattern.  On top of that, I made freeform 'bubbles' out of silvery beads, and finished off the cuff with a simple, classy sterling silver bar clasp.

You can go to the EBW blog starting September 9th to vote for your favorite entry in the September Challenge!  In the meantime, you can search for 'ebwc' on Etsy to get a sneak peak at the gorgeous entries.