The inspiration for this choker comes from the beautiful Ghanaian star beads made from recycled glass. They are much more difficult to source than the spherical ones so an exciting find. I’ve used a very fresh and pretty shweshwe (100% cotton) made by the Three Cats factory in East London, South Africa.
Shweshwe is becoming increasingly popular with international tourists visiting South Africa which is great because local textile shops are stocking a greater variety in order to meet the demand and this means that I have more to chose from too! However the price has gone up by 100% since I first started using it just over two years ago. I’ve used hemp yarn for the binding. I can only get the hemp in it’s natural creamy shade so I hand dye it specially for each necklace to get exactly the colour I want. Such are the daily problems faced by craftspeople in Africa. The positive side is that we are forced to find our own creative solutions!
The beautiful brass beads are made by hand in Ghana using the very labour intensive lost wax method.
The choker looks fabulous worn with the fastener as a feature in the front, to the side or behind the neck and at 147 grams (slightly more than a quarter of a block of butter) it’s really light and easy to wear.
If your neck is 34/35cm in circumference or under, then Sea Star will fit you perfectly.
