Lock of Baby Hair Preserved as a Keepsake

Do you remember the first hair cut your child had as a baby or toddler? The excitement but also the sadness of cutting off those first precious locks of hair. Most of us who have children will remember that time and no doubt a lot of us kept a lock of that first precious hair too.

This is the first baby hair keepsake that I made, containing a lock of hair from my child’s first haircut and it is kept within his baby box.

First hair cut keepsake pendant

Setting white hair in resin jewellery

Some customers mention to me that they have received advise that white hair or fur does not work within resin jewellery. This simply is not true. Depending upon the texture (and whiteness) of the hair, sometimes it may become less visible within the jewellery, however this is not always the case. White hair or fur can be just as visible as coloured hair within the resin jewellery, which is why I always ask people who want me to preserve white hair within resin to email me a photo of the hair so that I can advise further.

Where two colour tones of hair are required to be preserved within resin jewellery, where one of the colours is white (i.e., white/brown hair or white/black hair), there is sufficient contrast in hair colours that the white hair or fur will be visible. Here is an example of white pet fur being displayed against the brown fur within a resin pendant. As you can see, the white fur is clearly visible due to the contrast in colours when set against the brown fur.

White and brown fur resin pendant

When there is no contrast in hair colour available, for example if the hair is only pure white, the resin behind the hair can be coloured to any contrasting colour to allow the white hair to become more visible. Here is an example of quite fine white fur being displayed within a resin pendant that has had a black colour applied to the resin behind the fur.

Coloured resin pendant with white hair

Similarly, white horse hair will be visible within resin jewellery if the pendant is coloured to a contrasting colour, here is an example of white horse hair set within resin pendants or charms that have been coloured blue behind the hair. Any suitable contrasting colour can be used to create this effect.

Coloured resin pendants for white horse hair

Setting the white hair within a sterling silver pendant bezel can also improve the visibility of the white hair. here is an example of white (or cream) hair set within a sterling silver backed pendant. As you can see, the sterling silver backing of the pendant provides sufficient contrast to allow the hair to be visible.

Silver backed pendant for white hair

And lastly, here is an example of three hair colours (cream, black and white) from a brindle-coloured pet, set within a sterling silver and resin pendant.

Resin pendant with brindle coloured hair

Many thanks for reading about my methods of setting white hair within resin jewellery and I hope that it gives you confidence that it can be achieved.

Mick

Coping with Pet Loss – My Bunny Mad Magazine Feature

I was contacted late last year by Lisa of ‘Bunny Creations’ who produces a quarterly magazine called Bunny Mad Magazine. The magazine that she produces is lovely and contains lots of information for anybody who loves rabbits and pets. For the Spring/Summer edition of the magazine, Lisa was including a special feature about coping with the loss of a pet and wanted me to write a little about myself and in particular about my pet keepsake jewellery.

The latest edition of Bunny Mad Magazine was produced last week and Lisa was very kind in sending me a copy which included my feature, and here it is:

Bunny Mad Magazine

For anybody who is unable to see a copy of the magazine (although I would recommend it because it is really lovely), I have included my feature below...

Capturing Your Memories - My Magazine Feature

“I have been creating and making jewellery for many years now after a long career as an engineer. I had always had a secret artistic side that escaped once in a while, but the urge to be creative got the better of me and after seizing an opportunity to take some time out to be a full time dad to my son, I decided I wanted to do something more with this creative side of me. So I decided to start making my own jewellery.

I was particularly interested in resin jewellery. The science, diversity and sheer beauty fascinated me along with the ability to encase almost anything within it. So that is what I did, taking every day objects and encasing them in resin in wonderful shapes, sizes and colours.

It’s amazing what you can encase in resin. Flowers, confetti, stones, fabric, I’ve even done toe nails – yes, really!

I would have said nothing could surprise me, but when one day I received an e-mail from someone asking me if I cold encase some animal fur from a lost pet, I was slightly taken aback. I’d never been asked to deal with something potentially very sensitive and special. But when that one request turned into lots of requests, I knew I had to provide a service.

Pet Keepsake Jewellery

So, I started helping customers who had lost pets and wanted to have a keepsake or piece of jewellery so that they had their pets with them always. Or provide a happy reminder that they could look at when they wanted to. And it wasn’t just dearly departed pets either, I had a lot of customers who thought a piece of their pet’s fur, hair and even feathers would also be stunning, from pets who were still very much alive and happy.

Fur and hair from precious pets are only part of what I’ve done. I’ve also dealt with pet’s ashes too. It may sound cheesy to some, but it is actually very humbling to provide a special keepsake or item of jewellery knowing someone will find peace and comfort in it, or sheer joy at how stunning their pet’s fur or hair looks captured in resin.

Pet Hair Keepsake

I’ve had all sorts of special pet memorabilia pass through my doors, from hamsters, budgies, to cats, dogs and even horses. And, not forgetting of course, very special bunnies. Some of the rabbit fur I’ve encased is absolutely stunning. It’s amazing to work with and brings sheer delight to my customers when they see the end result.

I currently preserve the hair, fur and ashes within many types of jewellery including pendants, bracelets, rings, brooches, cufflinks, earrings and bangles and also offer an engraving service for the sterling silver items of jewellery. For those people not necessarily looking for an item of jewellery, I also make paperweights. I have a whole gallery of stunning pictures showing my work, and I pride myself on providing a special personalised service. At the end of the day, each one of my customers is unique, and so are their pets.”

If you would like to see some recent examples of my pet keepsake jewellery, please visit my website gallery.

Mick

My latest pet keepsake bracelets

You may remember on a previous blog post where I showed my latest pet hair keepsake bracelet. Well, last week I was asked to make a similar bracelet for a lady who wanted a keepsake to her pets while they were all alive and well.

This bracelet is sterling silver and has seven charms represented her different pet animals; each bracelet charm is also engraved on the back with the corresponding pet’s name. The bracelet contains animal fur and hair from some types of pet that I have not worked with before and includes two cats, three gerbils, two dwarf hamsters and some snake skin that had been shed.

Pet hair keepsake bracelet

Last week was quite a week for making pet keepsake bracelets and here is three more that I made for a lady in the states. The heart shaped charms are resin and contain the hair from some of her dogs. Unfortunately I cannot engrave the resin charms so instead I have embedded silver lettering within each charm to spell out the name.

This charm bracelet contains the hair from Brutus and his name has been spelt with silver lettering and I have also included some crystals to give it a twinkle!

Dog hair bracelet

This lovely rainbow bracelet includes the hair from three different dogs.

Pet fur bracelet

And finally a second keepsake bracelet in rainbow colours for a dog called Sandy.

Rainbow pet keepsake bracelet

Thank you for looking at my latest pet keepsake bracelets and I hope you all have a great bank holiday!

Mick

Personalised pet hair and fur keepsake bracelet

Thought I would show off a bracelet that I made this last week as I am quite proud of it. I was asked to make a keepsake bracelet for the owner of six dogs so that she could carry a small piece of her pets’ fur with her wherever she goes.

Initially she was happy with the suggestion of having a charm bracelet with six small silver charms. Each charm would hold a small piece of her dog’s fur and would hang from the bracelet chain. But then I had a moment of inspiration and suggested making this bracelet.

Pet hair bracelet design

The lovely thing about this bracelet is that I could size it exactly with the addition of jump rings. Also each charm is interconnected rather than hanging to form the bracelet. The whole bracelet would be sterling silver including the toggle clasp. The lady was happy to go with my suggestion and I was equally happy to have been given the opportunity to make something different.

Pet fur bracelet

Each of the six silver bezels within the bracelet holds a small sample of the dog’s fur which has been sealed with resin. The bracelet was further personalised with each dog’s name engraved onto the back of each charm.

Personalised pet hair bracelet

She was extremely pleased when she received her keepsake bracelet and also informed me that the fit was perfect. This was brilliant news because I had made a very last minute decision to extend the bracelet a little. She also let me know that she runs a puppy and dog training academy and has subsequently offered me some excellent publicity; and has also given me an idea for a new range of jewellery so watch this space!

If you would like to see some more of my recent commissions for pet hair and fur keepsake jewellery please visit my pet hair keepsakes gallery.

Personalised Pet Hair Keepsake Jewellery

You may remember a recent blog post when I mentioned my Personalised Horse Hair Jewellery and how I included silver lettering within the pendants to represent the horse’s name or initials. Well, this has proved to be quite popular now with my pet hair and fur keepsake jewellery so I thought I would show a couple of recent examples.

I made this bracelet last week for a lady from Virginia USA who wanted some keepsake jewellery making for her recently departed pet dog. The order was initially for a couple of engraved pendants containing her fur, however the order grew over time and one of the items she wanted making was this lovely rainbow coloured bracelet.

Personalised pet hair keepsake jewellery

I have included a small amount of her dog’s fur within each of the six charms and included a small rhinestone crystal. The name of her dog ‘Maggie’ has been spelt out using silver lettering and I have coloured each charm to represent the colours of the rainbow.

The second item of pet keepsake jewellery that I want to show you was made for a pony sanctuary in Kent a couple of weeks ago. These were intended as gifts for the people who helped look after the old ponies at the sanctuary. I was asked to make thirteen of these keepsakes and each one was presented on pieces of ribbon within their display boxes.

Personalised horse hair jewellery

I have included a small tassel of each pony’s hair within the keepsakes along with silver lettering to represent the name or initials for the pony.

If you would like to see more of my horse and pony jewellery please visit my Horse Hair Jewellery gallery.

If you would like to see more keepsake jewellery from other pets including cats, dogs, rabbits and even budgies, please visit my Pet Hair Keepsakes gallery.

Mick

Pet Hair and Fur Keepsake Ring

You may remember my last blog post where I mentioned that I had an order from Taiwan; well it has been completed now so I thought I would show it off. The customer initially wanted a pendant with some of her pet Golden Retriever’s fur encapsulated within it and then decided to also have a ring to match.

She also asked if I could also include the number ‘22’ within the keepsake ring and pendant as it was a special number for her and her dog. Sourcing the numbers was initially quite tricky but I do like a challenge. After hunting around various craft shops etc I finally discovered them at a supplier of dolls house miniatures; they are in fact miniature brass house numbers!

Pet Hair Keepsake Ring

This is the first hair or fur keepsake ring that I have made; I have made many pendants and bracelets in the past encapsulating hair but never a ring. The ring is sterling silver, fully adjustable to fit any finger size and the dog’s fur and number ‘22’ have been sealed with resin. I also made a pendant to match and included a couple of extra goodies since it was my first order from Taiwan!

The pendant and ring both arrived safely in Taiwan and she was very happy with them, in fact I quote ‘OH MY GOD..I got my package today and am honestly at a loss for words!’ It is lovely to receive great feedback like that an equally amazing to know that my keepsake jewellery is being worn and loved on the over side of the world!

Custom Jewellery - Pet Hair Keepsakes

I seem to be spending a lot of time recently making custom jewellery for people and particularly hair keepsake jewellery. The majority of this has been horse hair pendants, in fact I currently have seven different horse hair pendants in progress in my craft room, all at different stages of completeness and all requiring different colourings and other objects included...as you can imagine it takes quite a lot of organisation!

So to be given the opportunity last week of making a dog hair/fur pendant was quite pleasing and especially because of the background behind the order. These are the completed dog hair pendants, the original request was just for the heart pendant, but quite often I like to give an extra something and so I also made the sterling silver pendant as a gift.

Dog hair keepsake jewellery

The background to this order started when I had a problem with one of my website pages. Instead of asking my usual contacts via craft forums and other networks, I decided to ask for help on a technical forum related to website building. Not only did I get a solution to the problem, the respondent also emailed me to place an order for the dog hair pendant and he lives in the USA!

So the experience I have gained from this is that it is often quite natural to seek the comfort of the places that are familiar but to expand into unknown territories can be quite positive! The customer for the dog hair pendant also wrote a wonderful message to me (which can be seen here on my website testimonials page).

A dog hair jewellery keepsake - In memory of Kesha

This is a recent custom jewellery order that I was asked to make, and it was a real pleasure to create something so special. It is Kesha's dog fur/hair preserved within resin pendants. Kesha was a much loved and sadly missed dog who’s owner wanted something so that (in her words) ‘Kesha will be with me forever now’.

Dog hair keepsake pendants

I made these pendants with great pleasure as I knew how much they would mean to the owner. There is no better feeling than using my creativity and producing something so sentimental and personal to the owner. Providing a piece of jewellery that is not just an item of jewellery but a keepsake full of memories.

The memory of Kesha will now be kept close to her owner forever...

Please visit my pet hair keepsake Jewellery website page for more examples of pet hair keepsakes.