Jewelry Making

I came across some elegant jewelry through Style Bakery the other day. Carrie Schafer of Original Hardware creates beautiful necklaces, earrings and bracelets characterized by earthy colors and textures. Taking much of her inspiration from nature and travels abroad, the Colorado-based artist uses rustic handmade silver paired with warm-colored precious stones like carnelian, smokey quartz and jade in her pieces.

I especially like her use of hand-dyed chocolate colored silk and leather to compliment the natural colors of the stones and oxidized silver pieces. Another common design touch in her work includes the use of loops and ovals of silver with gemstones hanging within. Carrie is all about the “road less traveled” and that’s clearly reflected in her design… here’s a blurb from her website:

My design philosophy is simple: make pieces that reflect the strength, beauty and individuality of its wearer… I like to make pieces that are off-the-beaten path and incorporate the cultures and colors of the exotic places I’ve travelled.

Continue reading “Original Hardware” …

More mail for today. This one is actually something that I’ve been interested in figuring out as well:

From the Bloglander Jewelry Making Mailbag:

Don P. writes: “Hi, I’m trying to find ‘blank’ adjustable finger rings. I’d like to glue unmatched old earrings to these bands to make unusual finger rings. I’m having trouble finding these plain adjustable bands. Could you direct me? Thanks.”

Bloglander Jewelry Making says: We haven’t really used these adjustable ring blanks in making rings as of yet, though we’ve always been interested in giving a shot one of these days. Up until this point we’ve only tried making ring blanks out of wrapped silver or basemetal wire (this might be an upcoming tutorial). But we’d always wondered if there were options for times when you just want to glue some pieces on the top of a ring.

I believe that there are 2 types of ring blanks commonly sold, adjustable ring blanks with a pad and adjustable ring blanks with loops (often known as Charm Rings?) I did a quick lookup on Rings n Things and found the two items pictured at left that might fit the bill for you. You may want to take a look at other jewelry resellers and compare prices and styles.

The first (pictured on the left) are called Adjustable Glue-On Finger Rings and feature a round textured 1cm flat pad on which you can glue stuff. The ring itself adjusts size as well. The only thing is that there are only base metal or silver/gold plated ring blanks.

The other ones are called Adjustable Finger Rings with Loops and these come with 1 or 3 loops connected to the band. They are adjustable as well, except for the sterling silver one which is not. These are also called Charm Rings because you can just attach charms directly to the loops.

I’m not sure if the above links will work since they’re CGI based… if not, try go to the Rings n Things website and navigate into “Our Products” -> “Specialty Findings” -> “Finger Rings”.

Whew, I’ve FINALLY got a new article up. Lately, I haven’t had any time at all to devote to these tutorials. They take up an immense amount of time to photograph and write. But I figured it was about time for a new one, and plus this tutorial serves as a “Mailbag” answer for several similar questions that have come in. (A quick note: I’ve also gotten a hold of a new camera so the pictures are going to be “off” for a bit until the functionality is learned.)

Basically, to paraphrase the question asked by 3 readers so far:

How do you connect a closed ring jewelry clasp to a length of cable type footage jewelry chain?

We actually wrestled with this one, trying many different ways. In the end, the method that we use most frequently is outlined in the tutorial below. We basically use a wirewrapped accent bead to connect any two closed loop metal pieces. I hope this helps out the readers who wrote in to ask this question… sorry this answer comes so late.

Attaching Chain to Clasps with Wirewrap Accents