Maricopa Point

Southwestern Cross Earrings

I love the southwest! How can a person get to be my age and have never seen the Grand Canyon? I don't know, but it's true. So this year my husband and I traveled to some spots that I somehow have missed along the way. It mas May and still mercifully cool the day we drove from Las Vegas to the south rim of the canyon. One of the vistas on the southwest side of the canyon is called Maricopa Point. A beautiful name for a beautiful spot, but I was curious as to its origin. As it turns out the Maricopa are a native tribe that once lived in this area, along the Colorado River.

Our trip inspired me to design three collections, these earrings are from my Maricopa Point Collection. My first collection was called Joshua Tree, and a future one will be named for the eastern entry to Yosemite called Tioga Pass.

Maricopa pottery is still well known in the southwest. One of its characteristics is the distinctive reds and ochre, much like the colors of the Grand Canyon. This beautiful piece is from Andrea Fisher.

My native Maricopa inspired earrings focus around white copper southwestern crosses from Kristi Bowman, to which I have added colorful Czech beads for that tribal look and rustic copper accents and ear wires. Mixed metals make them more primitive looking, and I like the contrast it adds as well.







Gloria Ewing
Chrysalis Too on Etsy
Chrysalis Jewelry on Artfire

Mohican Legacy

Mohican Earrings

It is possible to find inspiration in some very strange places. One of my favorite movies is "Last of the Mohicans" based on the book by James Fennimore Cooper. At the very end of the movie, the vengeful and sadistic Huron enemy, Magwa, is undone by Chingachgook with a battle axe type weapon. What does this have to do with earrings, you may be asking yourself? It is the fascinating shape of the weapon that has been stuck in my mind, wondering how I might be able to incorporate that shape into a design.

When I saw these chrysocolla wings, I knew the time had finally come to design earrings inspired by this beautiful native weapon. I added rusty red and brown Greek ceramic spacers and African copper rounds to the chrysocolla for contrast, and wrapped them in a heavier gauge oxidized copper wire to maintain their primitive character.

We find inspiration in the things we are drawn to, and I have always been a great admirer of native American culture. Even the native weapons had artistic lines and artful embellishments.



Gloria Ewing
Chrysalis Too on Etsy
Chrysalis Jewelry on Artfire