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Amazing Enamel Effects

Buying a kiln recently has given me the chance to experiment with enamelling on larger pieces of copper and to produce some really cool effects. These effects happen when you combine different types of enamel. I usually use smaller flat pieces of copper for making enamelled earrings and have had some of these effects happen when firing with a torch but they are much more obvious when you use larger pieces. I made a few practice pieces which you can see in the photos below. This was flux {a transparent enamel not to be confused with soldering flux!} applied straight onto copper and fired until the copper was a bright golden colour. Then I added a layer of liquid enamel in green and red over the flux and fired again.  The lines and spots form when the enamel becomes hot enough to start moving and in this case the transparent pushes through the liquid enamel layer forming these cool lines and spots. The effect is better in the green liquid enamel than the red.  Next is an
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Nylon Dapping Block - Another Useful Tool

If you're like me and you love adding pattern and texture to your metal jewellery you've no doubt come up against the problem of forming a piece of metal with a pattern on it. In my case most of my forming involves using a dapping block or steel stakes. If you hit a piece of textured/patterned metal with a metal tool like a hammer or dapping punch the pattern will become flattened and spoilt. My previous method of stopping this from happening when I wanted to dome a patterned piece of metal would be to use leather to protect the pattern as in this photo... As you can see the leather soon ends up looking a bit battered. It does work but one day when I was flitting about in internetland I came across a nylon doming block and it became a  thing I needed to have . So after searching for quite a long time I discovered you can't get them in the UK. Hmm, no surprise there. I did manage to find one on Amazon  from a US seller and for under £5 with postage also under £5 I

My Jewellery Shed Gets A Lick Of Paint

At the end of last summer, after an incredibly busy few months jewellery-wise, I decided to take a break and repaint my shed. I'd painted it a pale green colour when I first got it and it was starting to look a bit faded and sad. So I did what I expect most people do and started looking online at what wonderful colour I could repaint it. There are lots of great colours out there by Cuprinol and Ronseal and the DIY stores own brands. I took a long time deciding on a colour then got in the car to go and buy the paint. That's when I discovered that B&Q and Homebase only carry a limited selection of shed paint colours {8 if you're lucky} and if you then find something in stock you do like they quite often don't have it in the size pot you need! So the colour I bought was a bit of "Oh buggar it, that'll have to do". Luckily it turned out to be similar to what I'd originally wanted by the time I'd finished the third coat - yes it took three coat

Black Friday Sale And New Silver Bangles

Starting today I'm having a Black Friday sale in my Etsy shop ! Everything is 10% off plus free shipping within the UK!  And like a lot of online shops my Black Friday sale extends beyond just the one day and doesn't finish until the 8th December! I recently got a batch of sterling silver bangles and cuff bracelets back from the London assay office and they are listed and ready to go in my Etsy shop. A curved anticlastic silver bangle with leaf vein texture. A silver cuff with leaf vein texture - I am quite fond of that texture :D The popular poppy bangle in bright or oxidized finish.   A cuff and bangle in my current favourite pattern and texture which is lines applied with a jeweller's saw and then using a frosting wheel to add a lovely matt finish to the silver. Shiny silver bangle with leaf vein texture {again}. Matt texture on a flat silver bangle decorated with twisted wire coils. A flat silver bangle with

Copper Poppy Cuff Bracelet

I've been making bangles for a few years now but have never thought about making cuffs until recently. Cuffs are very popular especially in copper as some people believe the copper helps with arthritis pain {although there's no scientific proof of this}. I decided to start making a couple of narrow copper cuffs to see how it goes and whether they sell. Copper cuff with hammered bark texture  Copper cuff with leaf vein texture I spent a stupid amount of time trying to work out the sizing of cuffs which isn't as simple as it might seem! I make them to fit the buyer's wrist size not a general 6 inch length piece of metal fits all approach {it doesn't}. After making a couple for myself I finally worked out how to get the sizing right. I haven't had any returns yet so the sizing must be ok....:D Soon after I started listing the cuffs I got a request from a buyer in France who had bought one of my copper poppy bangles .... She asked to return

Double Twist Copper Bangle

I love the look of twisted wire and thought I'd have a go at making a double twist copper bangle. I took a length of thinner gauge twisted copper wire I'd had hanging around for a while and decided to twist it together with a length of 3.25mm copper wire to make a round bangle.  As this bangle started off as just a practice piece I didn't pay too much attention to what gauge wire the thinner twist was but I think it was two pieces of 18g {1mm} that I'd twisted in my flexshaft. In order to twist the two pieces of wire together I was going to need to use my vice and a pair of locking pliers. I soon realized that the vice and the pliers weren't going to hold the two separate pieces of wire together securely due to the amount of tension produced as they were twisted so I needed to solder both wires together at either end to keep them in place.  Once I started twisting the two wires they soon became work hardened and I could feel the tension produced