New Earring Monday - 10/27/08

Today's earrings were actually a boo-boo I did at the retreat. I picked up tiny 4mm bezels instead of the 6mm, and didn't notice until after I had soldered them to the domes. I set little onyx stones instead of the 6mm denim lapis I had planned, but I thought the stones looked way too small, so I kind of set them aside for a while. However, the more I looked at them the more I liked them, and now I'm keeping this pair for me! I've decided they look a bit zen-like in their simplicity, and I really like the way they look on the ear. Soooo, they became this week's new design. I'll be making them with different colored stones - nice little red garnets, iolite, jade, moonstones, and whatever else strikes my fancy, or comes my way as a request. I'm making a pink rhodochrosite pair for my Mom - she likes them too!

New Earring Monday - 10/06/08

One of my goals now that I am a full-time jewelry artist is to make sure that I am productive yet still fresh. I'm always thinking about new designs and sketching them, but they don't always become reality when I am busy filling orders. Everyone loves earrings, including myself, so look here every Monday for the week's new design. Today we have Casual Swirl earrings in handforged fine silver. They are just about 1 1/4 inches, and are great little everyday earrings, yet still a bit different. I put them up in the Etsy shop yesterday.

What's on the Bench - Works in Progress

I am just itching to spend a few days down at the bench with my torch, but haven't had time. These are my next projects just waiting to be started. Maybe tonight when I get home from the day job - we'll see. The pink is absolutely luscious Peruvian Opal, with a little purple sugilite for an accent. That will be one of the smallest stones I've ever made a bezel setting for - we'll see how that goes, lol. The other cool stone is a huge crazy lace agate with gorgeous patterning, accented with a chrysocolla stone. I really love the taupe color of the agate with the bright turquoise of the chrysocolla. Stay tuned for progress photos.....

First project with my new torch!

I finally got a "real" torch that gets hot enough for any type of project. It's a wonderful Smith Acetylene/Air system, and I really love it. Very quiet, with a nice soft flame that's easy to control. Sooooo much better than the butane torches I was using! This ring is big - it goes knuckle to knuckle, and it was no problem getting the whole thing hot at the same time for soldering. I love the stone, too - it's Opalite, and the mix of colors means it goes with just about anything! I've got a big stash of great cabochons building up, so I'll be busy as a bee the next few months making new lovelies. Stay tuned.....

Just a bit of practice....

I took a class in the process of reticulation in November. Reticulation is a fun (and a tad lengthy) process that creates a very cool wrinkled texture on the surface of silver. This piece of sterling was one of the "experimental" pieces. I am not the most patient of souls, and I was anxious to put the torch to this piece instead of doing a few more cycles to make the fine silver skin a little thicker. I was also curious to see how a thinner skin of fine silver would affect the process. This very gentle dapple is the result. I kind of like it, even though it is not nearly as dramatic as the other pieces. I set a little oval of lapis into it to play up the shape of the ripples. I have many plans for the other pieces, too... stay tuned!

Silver Swirls.....

I've been dying to do some filigree, but don't have the tools required yet. I was playing with my fine silver wire last night, and these swirly earrings happened. I love them (so much that I'm keeping this pair!) and they are fun to make. I think these will become a regular item on my web site. Tonight I'm going to take the hammer to a pair for a little different look. Stay tuned....

Another pair of hand-forged earrings....

This is a pair of earrings I did last fall when I first started forging fine silver. I'm in the mood to play with this again, and really love the look of copper and silver together, so I've decided to add a new section to my online store specializing in hand-forged pieces in these two metals. More soon!

Hammered Silver and Borosilicate glass bead set

Hand forged and hammered silver is accented with a trio of little boro glass beads for the earrings, and the necklace has a heart pendant dangling from a cluster of the little teardrop shaped beads. The pattern inside these beads reminds me of old-fashioned marbles. I'll be working on more items using these lovely bits of glass - stay tuned!

Fun with Rings!

Still playing around with metal, and have found that I love making rings! I've started a new line of fused and hammered pinky and stacked ring sets. The

little pinky rings are made from handmade ball-ended headpins which are then bent and hammered into shape. I'm thinking about added some that also have little gemstone dangles - we'll see. The stacked rings are little sets of 3 or 5 fused circles that have been hammered in different ways to provide some texture. Stay tuned for variations on this idea, too - I'm thinking little tiny bezel-set gems would be fun here....

Irai Citrine and more Fun with Metal...

I have had this 8mm round Citrine from the Irai mine in Brazil for more than a year, and couldn't decide what to do with it. The Irai mine is known for producing these lovely deep reddish-orange citrines, which are supposedly not heat-treated. I was playng around with a hammered copper focal and decided that the citrine looked really pretty with the copper. I set it in a simple little setting and dangled it inside one of my fused silver circles. I will be doing some additional pieces that are variations on the hammered, V-shaped focal - lots of embellishment possibilities here!

Fine Silver, A Hammer and a Torch

I am taking a long distance class in metal fusing from Iris Sandkuhler of Sandkuhler Studio in Pacifica, California. She is a very

talented artist, and her course has opened up a whole new world of creative possibility for me. I'm having sooo much fun creating new things. Fine silver, which is .999 pure silver, (unlike sterling which is .925 pure and tarnishes faster) has been a joy to work with. Fine silver must be used when fusing in order for the metal to melt and fuse together correctly. The technique involves making shapes where the the ends of the metal are touching as smoothly and completely as possible, then heating with a torch until the metal becomes liquid and fuses, but still retains the original shape. The piece is then textured, shaped some more if needed, polished and embellished with whatever comes to mind. Here are a couple of my first pieces...