Sweet Succulents

Colors are the smiles of nature. ~ Leigh Hunt

Marsha Neal has an eye for color.

I have always loved her ceramics, the colors of glaze she uses are so soft and pretty, but the silks that she sells in bundles have always made me giddy. I love that I can buy just the colors I need or select from dozens of color combinations where Marsha has taken out the guesswork for me on what goes with what.

Marsha organized a little contest where she invited 12 designers and art bead makers to select from her extensive collection of colors to pull together custom silk cord palettes based on a set of inspiration pictures called the Silk Color Palette Challenge. That just sounded like fun.

I was inspired by the upper left photo of the succulent plants. For Christmas, *Santa* brought a kit for a small terrarium that came from an Etsy seller *elf* from Arizona named Succulent Designs. We are mostly keeping it alive on our windowsill, so when I saw the picture that is the one I was drawn to.

I pulled out the following colors from Marsha's stock:

#57 - Chartreuse

#210 - Sage Green

#98 - Moss Green

#101 - Light Gray

#216 - Dark Lilac

#220 - Deep Mauve

And here is what I said about the palette I call Sweet Succulents:
These succulents are a pleasing palette of greens and purples, grays and pinks. The radiating shapes of the petals is mesmerizing. Their soft rounded shapes pair well with these muted colors with the unexpected lilac and mauve tones to ground it and the pop of bright green thrown in to liven it up.


You can purchase this exact color palette by going to Miss Marsha's website, or you can go to her Etsy store (where she is having a Destash sale - her sales are awesome!) and pull together your own palette for the inspiration.

Here are some ways to win and play along in the contest...
1. For every one of the "12 finalist palettes" (not just mine, but all of them!) that you buy during this current challenge time period - you will get one (1) entry for winning a $50 Marsha Neal Studio Clay Pieces gift certificate.
2. Marsha Neal Studio will be hosting some design challenges with these Silk Color Palette Challenge silk knot bundles. For updates & info you can sign up to receive Marsha's email newsletter (found on the sidebar of her blog or by clicking this link).
3.  Marsha has plans to do this again, so in May you could be one of these lucky 12 next time if you come up with a palette & get voted in. How much fun is that?

Details about the "Silk Knot Bundles":
(10) 2mm silk ribbon cords are in each silk knot bundle.
These silks are over a yard in length (40-42" long each).
They are color fast and hand washable in a mild detergent.
The 2mm silks are hand stitched and can be cut at any length without them unraveling

And from experience I can tell you that these silks are high quality and the colors are radiant. They add such a nice textural element to any design.
Would you like an additional opportunity to win from me?
I will giveaway the Sweet Succulents palette and a Marsha Neal pendant from my stash to coordinate with it to one lucky commenter on this post. I will announce the winner on Friday, March 9th.
Leave a comment below to win the Sweet Succulent palette from Marsha Neal Studio!

P.S. Only comments with a way to contact you will be entered in the drawing, so if you don't have your email turned on in your profile, be sure to leave it in the comment! (Psst... I always respond to every comment by email, so if you don't receive a personal response from me, it is only because your email is not turned on!)