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Metaalia Jewelry

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Metaalia Jewelry

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Process

 

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I photocopy the design in my sketchbook, cut it out and paste it directly to my sheet of silver. 
I didn’t picture the hole drilling, but as you see, there are 46 holes drilled in each place I plan to cut out. This process is called piercing: cutting shapes out from within the metal.  I feed the saw blade through the hole, secure the blade
A few hours later...
  Normal   0   0   1   2   17   1   1   20   11.1539     0       0   0   Phew! Done. Kinda. 
A couple more hours of this….
These silver strips are the bezels that wrap around the stones and eventually hold them in place. There's a lot trimming, filing & sanding involved in achieving the right bezel shape and height. 
Solder them in place! Propped up on the firebrick, I position the bezel on the earring, brush flux & place little chips of solder down. Too much solder can become a miserable mess resulting in time wasted filing & sanding to clean it all up.
This is the time I start sweating. Most cautionary tales in jewelry making involve the torch: overheating and accidentally melting parts of your piece, overheating and causing firescale (a reddish stain on your sterling that can only be removed by f
Ta-da! Thankyou, thankyouverymuch. The successfully soldered pieces are bathing in the pickle. Metal oxidizes when it’s heated & this mild acid cleans it off.  It works faster when warm. Thus, the crock-pot.  
Before I was ready to set the stones, I did more clean up of the pierced sections around the bezel using my saw and files. 
You smooth out those ripples with the bezel rocker. This is also steel and can do some serious damage if you’re not careful. But oh, how it makes everything so much prettier. Happy bezel!
Stone setting! Here I use a bezel pusher, basically a short, square, steel rod to push  the top of the bezel over the curve of the stone. I’ve covered my earring with masking tape to protect the piece from deep, soul-crushing scratches that the
  This agate burnisher makes the bezel even more smooth and super shiny. The stone should be secure in the setting and not wiggle one bit. Next, I figure out where to drill the holes for the earring hooks. The stones are set and an angle throwing o
Big no-no here. I changed my mind about the finish I wanted on the metal so I buffed the sterling post stone-setting. Setting stones is The Absolute Last Step in Jewelry Making because you can so easily scratch or dull a stone with abrasives.
At this point, I’m home safe. Those are the earrwires. I ball up one end by melting it with my torch, hammer it into a flat disc and shape it with a file. 
I use pliers to bend a tiny loop at the hammered end & feed it through the ring on the earring. 
I use a mandrel as a form to wrap the wire around. This results in a nice smooth bend. 
Ah, perfect. I file & sand the other end of the wire, knocking off any sharp edges so it doesn’t ream my earlobe has it passes through. 
The portfolio shot. 
ALL DONE! I try them on, pout appropriately, make sure they hang well and are comfortable. 

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