Zipper Necklaces

What is it?  One has to look hard to identify the composition of this striking necklace!

My friend Louise makes fabulous handmade designer necklaces out of zippers.  She is a weaver and became interested in using utilitarian materials such as plastic plumbing tubes, pieces of metal, and rubber cord in her baskets. Always on the lookout for recycled or useful materials she stumbled upon a necklace made of zippers in South Africa and the rest is history! You can see she has developed her zipper necklaces into an art form.

There was a movement in the period between World War I and World War II called The Machine Age. It was a time when ordinary materials such as chrome, nickel, glass and plastics such as galalith and bakelite were used to make interesting geometric jewelry, furniture, etc.. The Jakob Bengel Factory described in my last post was an important producer of necklaces made from these materials. Louise's zipper jewelry is a descendant of the Machine Age thinking. Louise sells her necklaces in many Museum stores in the US and Europe. To contact her or see her creative and original jewelry, check out her website at zipblingjewelry.com.