Welcome to Bewitching Bijou

Hi there!!

Welcome to the Bewitching Bijou blog that is connected to my shop on Etsy. Here I will be posting my inspirations, like and dislikes along with some tutorials, some tips on how to make jewellery, sneak peeks and-of course-competitions and give-aways.

I need a little help from you to make all that happen so please like my facebook page : www.facebook.com/bewitchingbijou

My shop for those of you interested in what I make is on Etsy: www.etsy.com/shop/bewtichingbijou

To begin with let’s look at what Bewitching Bijou is to me.

Everyone has a dark side and a light side, a bad side and a good side, a rebellious side and a conformist side-think I have stretched that far enough! I call them the Temptress and the Princess sides. 

(Credit to Loren Jarvier, Flickr)

I had to include an Ariel picture in my first post!!

My jewellery plays to those two sides of our selves and out minds; the pretty and elegant side that is enchanting, graceful and full of compassion as well as the darkened, seductive temptress side which craves rebellion.

So my princess side says “Start a post about the pretty things, the animals and songs in your heart.” But the inner darkness calls, “No, start with something unique, tantilising and…dark.”

And, well, unfortunately Princess, this time Temptress wins.

My favourite thing about fairy tales is that they can be flipped around. Some of my favourite poetry is by a lady called Carol Ann Duffy-The World’s Wife. She wrote the poem Mrs Beast, a reference to Belle's (in the Disney versions) character. She plays with the idea that the "happy ending" is not all that it first appears to be. Here is an extract:

These myths going round, these legends, fairytales,
I’ll put them straight; so when you stare
Into my face – Helen’s face, Cleopatra’s,
Queen of Sheba’s, Juliet’s – then, deeper,
Gaze into my eyes – Nefertiti’s, Mona Lisa’s,
Garbo’s eyes - think again. The Little Mermaid slit
Her shining, silver tail in two, rubbed salt 
Into that stinking wound, got up and walked,
In agony, in fishnet tights, stood up and smiled, waltzed,
All for a Prince, a pretty boy, a charming one
Who’d dump her in the end, chuck her, throw her overboard.
I could have told her – look, love, I should know, 
They’re bastards when they’re Princes.

The fluffed up and the subversion of the fairy tales that we all know and love, and the characters around that are what my jewellery is about. It is about perhaps flipping the story on its head and exploring the idea that perhaps Prince Charming was charmed by another woman and ran off with her, or that Tinkerbell IS a villain, or that the Wicked Witch of the West was actually trying to good...(Go see Wicked, its awesome!!) Bewitching Bijou is, for me, a store that gives you two sides of the coin. Like Two-face you will find the dichotomy of good and bad within my store, between pure good and dark evil, from fluffy to hard edged. 

Today it seems that Temptress wins but tomorrow, who knows!!    

If this post seems very divided, well to see the stars you need both light and dark.