Cinnamon Jewellery

I thought I'd put my newly-learned bezel setting skills to the test and start making earrings with stones. It's a technique I've been itching to learn for a long time but I'll be honest the prospect of making a "proper" start on bezel set jewellery did daunt me a bit. There's so much that can go wrong - melting your bezel, the cab not fitting, getting to the point where everything is finished and you "just" have to set the stone and then you go and scratch it beyond repair with your bezel pusher......I've done that once (so far!) I have a bezel roller and a bezel pusher and a burnisher and all three of them have the potential to ruin all your hard work in a second by scratching the stone! I've now started using a peg I took apart and filed and sanded to round the top edge to set my stones. They're not the most ergonomic design being a bit short to hold but they work fine and don't scratch metal or stones if I slip. I...

Oh my goodness I was so excited when we finally got round to bezel setting at my Tuesday night silver jewellery course! It was really the reason I enrolled on the course and a technique I've been wanting to learn ever since I started making more metalwork style jewellery. I even bought some copper bezel wire from an Etsy seller several months ago with the idea of teaching myself. I thought about it then chickened out, reasoning that it looked quite technical and precise and I'd probably fair better being shown by a teacher! First we had to choose a stone. Alison the jewellery teacher was going to order them from Kernowcraft so after deliberating for a long time at home (I'm good at that) I choose a pretty 10mm round prehnite cab. When she came to order it at the class they were out of stock (course they were!) so I chose kyanite instead as the blue colour looked lovely. I made the ring band with D shaped silver wire then came the fiddliness that is measuring ...

I decided to deactivate my Facebook account today. I'm hearing a few sharp intakes of breath as some people read this I'm sure. I didn't decide to do it due to any particular problems I've had on Facebook, more cancelled due to lack of interest (on my part). I opened the account when I opened my Folksy shop as that was what people in the know said you should do when you start a business. And then of course I felt very inadequate because I didn't have hundreds of likers so I joined in the link love thing that was going on at the time and gained quite a few. Great, all these people interested in my jewellery..........except the majority weren't the slightest bit interested in what I make and just did the link love thing in order to gain more likers themselves. Not to be unfair, there were quite a few people who did genuinely like my jewellery and who would comment and like stuff I posted and some have become internet friends and customers which is great. B...

It's funny how stumbling across something as you wander around the internet sets you off on a new project. I was looking for storage for my bedroom and found a website called Ikea Hackers where people have altered items bought from Ikea. There was a post on how someone had pimped their Ikea Moppe mini drawers to resemble those library card storage drawers that are so expensive to buy now. I found the blog post by Kristine of The Painted Hive which explains how she did it and I was inspired to have a go myself! First I had to buy the drawers. There isn't an Ikea near Eastbourne, well there are stores at Lakeside and Croydon but they're a bit far unless you want to make a day of it. Blessed will be the day they open an Ikea in Brighton! I'm afraid I am an Ikea virgin and have yet to set foot in a store with all their things of loveliness I can only drool over from afar. So I bought the drawers on Amazon instead....... I sanded the unit to smooth the untrea...

I really love the mix of copper and enamel in jewellery - the colour of the oxidized copper really makes the enamels jump. So continuing my "thing" about circles (it's been going on since I was a child!) I made enamelled discs in various colours and combined them with paddle-shaped copper "sticks."  I haven't mastered the art of riveting enamelled pieces yet - it IS possible, I've seen other people do it but when I tried the enamel discs cracked. Another option would be to pin the enamelled discs by balling up silver wire on either side. I tried that too and only managed to ruin the enamelled piece. It did stick to the metal I wanted to attach it to but only because the enamel had refired and it would have cracked and fallen off eventually.  So I stuck to wire wrapping the enamel disc to the metal - less risk of breaking anything! I made these copper hoops a while ago and left them sitting on my work table until I decided w...

A couple of weeks ago I was asked by a fellow jewellery maker who regularly buys my handmade findings (you know who you are Lindsay!) if I could make some double ball ended silver wires like the dragonfly kisses made by The Dragonfly Company . I'll be honest I'd not heard of the website or Lynne Senior who sadly died recently, but ordered some fine silver wire and made some. My buyer wanted a particular (ish) length which I got to eventually - knowing how much wire gets eaten up when you form the ball means you can then work out what length to cut the wire  Fine silver is best to use as it forms nice smooth balls compared to the pitted, rustic look you get with sterling silver. They are used by twisting and wrapping into designs inbetween beads and also can be twisted once and dangled from loops if so desired. I might use some myself one day! In the meantime I quickly twisted some copper wires between jade beads to use as an example in my shops Copper...

With Valentine's Day fast approaching I thought it was time to write my first blog post of 2013. I can't believe my last post was on the 15th of December! I've been busy jewellery-wise recently "doing" hearts. I have a couple of heart templates which I made use of as I'm no artist drawing-wise and earrings tend to have to be matching! Here's some of the hearts I cut - I started off using my jewellery saw as that's the proper way to do it but, oh, I don't know, it just takes so damned long to do that I changed to using my Xuron shears with no ill-affect on the metal. I cut straight across at the top of the hearts then used my triangle file to file the "v". After filing and sanding the hearts were ready for the next stage. The hearts at the top were going to be enamelled, the larger etched hearts were to be adorned with a silver ball rivet and the smaller one's textured and dapped and stud posts soldered on. There's...