Adventures in Handmade Jewelry

I have been ignoring this blog. Yup. Bad blogger. So sue me. I've recently upped my jewelry game to the space I've always wanted to play in - I have progressed beyond wire - to sheet metal and other stuff. Real metal work and soldering.  It's what I've always wanted to do, but haven't. I'll keep the reasons why to myself because it doesn't matter. I'm equipped and practicing and soon I can produce something that I hope won't be awful. So what did I buy to round out my kit? Here we go. Stating with the lower left corner and going clockwise we have - Bezel wire (three sizes) Citric acid pickle Third hand Pickle pot (tiny crock pot) Copper tongs (not required for C.A. pickle, but that's ok) 3M polishing pads Tripod Copper sheets Saw blades Cuprinol anti-firescale spray Handy flux Flux picks Sheet solder and cannisters More brass and nickel silver sheets Burnisher (for bezel setting), gorgeous #4 file, and twe...

There must be a torch! UPDATE - this baby is sold! Gone. Woo hoo! Spent a few hours at the bench today. For a while now I've been wanting to fire up my torch and see if I could still wield it with any skill at all. Before I went on hiatus I had just begun fine silver fusing and found I really liked it. But I was hesitant. I hate wasting wire and I hate disappointing myself. I finally got my butt in gear and here's the result! Amazonite & fine silver bracelet I'm sort of amazed at how well it turned out. Oh sure, I have a few goofed links, but not as many as I feared. With each dud I learned what I did wrong and fixed it though, so it wasn't a total waste. The ones I used are nearly all perfect. One or two have a bit thicker side to them, but not so awful that I pitched them. That's the beauty of handmade, right? It's the thing we're all going for. At least what I'm going for. Quality pieces, even fine pieces, but without that assembly lin...

As you develop your craft, brand and artistic style, tailoring and refining designs is as important as coming up with new ones. I have a small library of wire jewelry making books and sometimes I use a design straight out of those pages. Often I make it as is, using the materials and measurements specified by the author. Sometimes it works perfectly like that, but sometimes I need to modify it to meet my own standards.  Recently I went through a few different variations with one bracelet trying to make it more wearable.  I love the smooth ribbons of sterling wire, but the original specs just didn't lay right. At least not on my wrist, which admittedly, is pretty small. It's possible that the piece with the longer ribbons would work on a larger lady and for that reason I have it in the shop (bottom one with the orange beads). But as I played with the pattern, I found that flat beads work better because they don't break the plane of the wires. They help t...

Adventures in Handmade Jewelry is right. Here's my latest and what I learned from it. Design is very important, but like all good designs it must work. It must function well and enhance the time you spend using it. I bought these cute little wooden cubes recently and had a design all done and finished. I loved it. Isn't it cute? I even had a name for it picked out (no, not Jeff). Then I tried to put it on. And realized I couldn't. It wouldn't bend enough to do up the clasp easily. Take a look - The most flexible part of the design is where the flattest part of your wrist is. Uh. Wrong. The bendiest part should be at the sides of the wrist. Right where I put those cute little cubes. Cute, but not bendy. Not comfortable all that much either. What happens to jewelry that's difficult to put on or wear? It sits in the drawer and collects dust. Or it gets tossed away if you're the letting go type. So back to the bench. This design works much ...

Monday motivation! I got back to the bench and made 4 pairs of earrings - I need to put them in the tumbler and get them polished up and the earwires hardened and then they can go in the shop. Except maybe for one pair that I love too much. Any guesses?  Well, I have enough material to make another pair so it's ok.  Still, I think they're rich and fun and interesting. I would be proud to wear any of them and have people ask me about them. Gasp! Maybe even to a snooty event next month which is hosted by a famous watch manufacturer that begins with the letter R. Heh.

It isn't perfect. It isn't well stocked. It isn't organized. But it's great to be back. I spent some time down there making these - Aren't they cute? Sterling silver hook and eye clasps. Very easy to make so that's where I started. It's funny how I used to just be able to do them without thinking, but now I follow a book's technique to get it right. And I used to know by experience how much wire would be taken up at any point on my pliers. Now, not so much. But my hammering technique came back to me. And why I bought a different hammer than the first one I tried. That one leaves to many marks in the metal and I prefer a smooth finish, not one with little dents. Am definitely in need of some more half-hard wire. Everything I have is dead soft. Some supplies are on the way, but not wire since I hadn't really looked at what I had or need. I'll feel my way through. Am debating whether to buy a new tumbler since the one I have is very ol...

Funny how that old cliche "use it or lose it" is actually true. Part of my grand plan, apart from reopening the store and all that entails, is regaining my skill with the wire. I used to be good. It was effortless sometimes how neat, symmetrical and repeatable my work was. Now, it's like I'm all thumbs. While polishing a bracelet in prep for getting it listed, I noticed one of the stones I used needed to be replaced. It's a charm-style bracelet and I was just using a headpin with a normal loop and wrap style attachment. It took some concentration to get a new one made. It came out fine, but it wasn't automatic you know? So you can see what's in my future, can't you? Practice! Practice! Practice!