May 10 2010
by C.S.

Coming up with colour combinations for some people is quite a difficult task. While others come by it quite naturally; they can just throw a bunch of colours together without much thought and they manage to all blend together with just the right amount of vibrancy, hue and saturation. When it comes to jewelry design learning how to successfully combine colours can help speed up the jewelry design process, and help you get your jewelry out there faster. That is why, we at Stones and Findings have created the Colour Search Option to make it easier for you.

If you fall into the category of the first group of people there are some things to think about that should give you just as good combinations as the second group of people. To start with there are three properties of colours to think about while making your combinations hue, value, and saturation. Hue is defined as the type of colour, blue, red, yellow and so on. Value is how light or dark a colour is- how much black, grey or white has been added to the colour. Saturation is also known as the intensity of a colour, how bright or dull it is.

While matching colours, think about what you want the final product to look like, and who you are making it for. If you are making it for someone else, think about what colour the person likes, what colours they often wear, and finally what colours look good on them. Next, do you want to have multiple colours that are all contrasting in saturation, or a combination of colours that just blend together with similar values? Think about the colour properties and how you can make them work for you.

A good way to start if you are completely lost and have only a vague idea of what colours you would like to use is to take a trip to your local hardware store and pull a bunch of paint chips. This will give you the ability to play with colour pallets and give you a sense of direction before you even go to buy your beads or design your piece of jewellery.

Another way to create your colour palettes if you have already picked out a starting colour is to use a colour wheel. From here you can move it around the wheel and see what colours it could work with, this will also give you an idea of what colours to stay away from. Some colour wheels have a window cut into the wheel so that you can place it on top of your item, and then proceed to move the wheel around until you find a pleasing combination.

If you take into account the various colour properties and you can justify why you are using each colour that you have selected then there is no reason why you can't create amazing colour combinations that turn into striking jewellery pieces.