The Blue Brick | Photography and Handcrafts by Shireen Nadir

I’ve been working a lot with this idea of preserving the leaves from the absolutely stunning autumn we just had – and I won’t lie to you, there are so many piles of FAIL around the house from earlier versions that today I threw away almost 80 pieces, either leaked or discoloured or broken, or covered in crazy glue (which I should never, ever, EVER be permitted to use under any circumstances. That I haven’t yet glued my eyelids together is a miracle.) After weeks and weeks of babysitting them, polishing them and dreaming about them I’ve finally honed it down, and I wanted to share some photos of the latest batch.

The necklace above contains a ginkgo leaf, and will be a Christmas gift for my beautiful pottery instructor who’s been a HUGE help this past term and really helped me take my throwing to the next level. She likes to use ginko leaves in her work and I think this will be a great surprise for her (assuming she doesn’t read my blog…).

These little beauties were an experiment in more vintage forms. I love it – I’ll definitely be making more of these!

Another vintage form – these will not be in the show but I love them enough that I’ll certainly be trying more forms like this one.

These guys (and more like them) are all intended to be used in the show. I’ve got plans for necklaces, earrings and bracelets as soon as the resin is fully cured. Each piece will come with a mounted 5×7 metallic print of one of the shots from this years Autumn photo shoot in the Terra Cotta conservation area.

Here’s one of the first pieces to be completed – a set of dangly earrings made from maple leaves and finished with leaf charms.

This one is also for the show – woven strands of waxed cord come out to form a bracelet, accented with silver beads.

These pieces will be in the show, and if they are popular then I’ll keep producing them and feature them on my Etsy page. If you think you might be interested, let me know and as soon as they’re available I’ll be sure and let you know =o)