Antique applique

A very good friend of mine gifted me with this pair of antique French jet appliques a number of years ago. As you can see they are not in the best of condition. I often see appliques like this on ebay, etsy, etc. etc. but always wonder what I could actually do with them. I've had these for a number of years on display in my bedroom, until one day it occured to me in a flash of genius that I may actually be able to fix them. So, I had a look through my bead collection, found similar small black beads, and started the fiddly job of making a new tassel for one of the appliques, and making 2 new dangly bits which you can see from the photo above are missing from the top of both appliques.  

This was the easiest bit...

Making a cluster of beads with 3 dangly bits half way down the tassel was tricky...its a very amateur attempt, but looks ok from a distance...

Yay- new tassel attatched

Couple of dangly bits missing from the top - these were easy to replace.

...et voilà!

When I started repairing the appliques, I always had in mind adding them to the shoulders of a blazer, to create some sort of epaulette effect. I wasn't sure about adding them to my fringe blazer, as I thought it would all look too much. But, pinning them on I realised that in fact they enhanced the jacket, as the shoulder area was pretty bare compared to the sleeves...so I went ahead and sewed them on. They've been pretty hard to photograph, but they do add a nice bit of twinkle at the shoulders, and the tassels hang down at the perfect length, mingling in with the fringing.