Sunny Yellow Enamel Bangle and Matching Pendant

Following up on my first batch of enameled bangles, I spent some time yesterday wrapping more steel bangles for enameling. After all the wrapping, I only had time to enamel one; it takes me about 45 minutes in the torch to get all the layers applied and fused!

Yellow Enamel Bangle

Yellow Enamel Bangle

I did wrap a few smaller circles, and had enameled them the same day I did the first set of bangles - here is the matching yellow one:

Yellow Enamel Pendant - 1.5 inches diameter

I know it's hard to tell from the pic - it looks the same as the bangle! But it is much smaller; try this:

Can't you just see this, tied to some leather, or some sari ribbon, with a simple lark's head knot? Or something more complicated - a beadwoven rope, a beaded necklace - ooh! A multistrand necklace, with this as a connector on one side, bringing all the strands together!

I made 4 of these, in different colors, and slightly different sizes. They are all available in my Etsy Supply Shop.

And the bangles are over in my Zibbet shop!

More sizes and colors of bangles to come!

Enameled Bangles - I love these!

I was playing around with steel wire, and decided to see if I could make some enameled bangles, and by golly, I did! And I love them!

Enameled bangles, available (separately) on Etsy

I started out with a trial run of four - I didn't want to invest too much time, wire, and enamel in this venture if it wasn't going to work!

They don't photograph as well as I'd like - they are very shiny! Bits of the steel wire show through, which gives a wonderful rustic look.

Lavender enameled bangle

Red Enameled Bangle

Seafoam Green Enameled Bangle

Blue Enameled Bangle

These are all medium bangles - their inner diameter is 2.75 inches, and their inner circumference is 8.25 inches. Since a bangle has to fit over your hand, it is the size of your HAND, not the size of your wrist, which determines your bangle size.

To more accurately determine your bangle size, you can measure your hand: put your thumb and 5th finger together. Wrap a soft tape measure around the widest part of your hand, and record the measurement. This will give you the inner circumference measurement for your bangle.

I've been walking around wearing them stacked - probably not the greatest idea, since they are GLASS, after all, but they are holding up fine. And they make a lovely clanking sound! But I don't really recommend stacking them, or banging them around on hard surfaces. They have been properly annealed, but they ARE glass.

They are all available in my Etsy shop.

Sterling Silver and Copper Wire Bangle

Newly renewed on Etsy - this sterling silver and heavy gauge copper wire-wrapped bangle bracelet. Good for what ails you!

Woven Wire Bracelet

This is a bangle bracelet I wove with 2 colors of 18g artistic wire - this wire is dead soft, so it is very easy to weave with. And I love the brown and the blue together!

This is the hook and eye closure:

Fun bracelet! And it's available in my Etsy shop!

New Beaded Wire-Wrapped Bangle

Happy October!!

I have had such a productive week! I completed 3 brand new designs, start to finish, plus I finished a custom-ordered kumihimo necklace and matching bracelet, and totally wowed their new owner. Always such a relief when the customer is happy!

I am so fortunate to have a full-time studio to work in - a dedicated place to design, create, photograph, and sell my work. But the downside is that it is 45 minutes away from my home, and I frequently leave all my computer work for my evenings and days off, and then realize I've left my memory card, or flash drive, or some other important documents sitting on the computer at work. And that's where I find myself today.

I was so proud to finish all these designs AND get all the pics taken and downloaded and edited, all in the same week! And now I find myself ready to blog about it, and my pics are literally in another state. So I will give you a little taste of one of my creations, and leave the rest for later on.

This is an absolutely delicious, lush, beaded sterling silver bangle. These red-banded agate beads are 12mm rounds, faceted and highly polished, and I fell in love with their rich coloration and swirls. The pinks range from the palest pink to a deep fuchsia, and the beads are so polished they literally look wet. They reminded me of freshly picked and washed raspberries! (I actually took to calling them "raspberry agate"). The minute I found these beads I nabbed them and stuffed them into my stash (you know what I'm talking about - we are all bead hoarders!), just waiting for the right project. And now I wish I had another strand!

This is a beaded wire bangle that I have made a number of times - it calls for 4 mm beads, and is fun to make. So I figured - 4mm, 12mm - what's the difference? Well, not exactly, but that's sort of what I thought - I figured I would just have to make a few "modifications" for the larger beads.

Ha!!

These beads were SO much bigger, and SO much heavier, that this became an almost overwhelming issue of engineering. I had to account for the bangle itself being wider, as well as the sizing being completely different because of the beads' diameter, and I also had to buttress the wires themselves just to get them to stay in bundles as I wrapped.

So I added lots of wraps along each side of the wire - these started out to be structural elements, but after I had done a few, I realized they looked great, so I decided to make a pair between each bead. These wires added both strength and texture to the bangle.

And while the sterling silver wire is perfect with these bright pink beads, the beads themselves are the real stars in this bracelet! This is such a bright, bold, dramatic accessory for so many different occasions. It can be dressed up, dressed down - it is so much fun! And it's available in my Etsy shop!

Many thanks to those of you who took the time to read my BSBP essay and leave comments. I visited each and everyone of my fellow BSBP participants, read every word, and was awed by all the talent.I know what a time commitment it was for those who blog-hopped for BSBP, and I truly appreciate your efforts and words. Thanks again!

SilverSmithing

I just returned from a week at William Holland Lapidary School, where I took my first Silver class.

So. Much. Fun!!

Had a great teacher (Hi, Bill!), and completed 4 projects, and have 2 partially done.

The class was structured such that we had lecture Sunday night for a couple of hours, and then started work bright and early Monday morning. There were 2 mandatory projects, and once we successfully completed those, we could move on to an independent project of our own design.

This bangle bracelet was our 1st mandatory project, and was a great teaching project and a good choice for a 1st project, because while it taught us a lot of metalwork techniques, believe it or not, this gorgeous bangle required only 1 solder! So we spent a long time prepping the piece - twisting the wire, hammering it, etc - and then got it set up for the solder, and although the teacher had demo'd it for us at his workstation, since it was each student's 1st time soldering, we were all a little nervous and unsure, so we would call him over to our workstations when we were ready, and then he would help each of us individually.

And it is a truly stunning bracelet!


The next mandatory project was a ring - the teacher had many cabochons to choose from, or we could use our own. I had taken a few with me, but once I saw this turquoise cab (made by my Silver teacher, who clearly has talents extending far beyond Silversmithing), I heard it calling my name, and decided to use it for my ring.

The ring was a very difficult project; many, many solder joins, as well as the other metalworking skills required to create it.

It took me most of 3 days to finish the ring, although I was able to jump around and work on my other 2 projects while I was waiting for equipment, or otherwise needing to wait before proceeding with another step on the ring. So it actually probably took only a total of a day and a half to finish the ring, not counting the interruptions and waiting.

And after making all these solders, and having the ring actually fit, and the stone stay in its setting, I had a lot more confidence in my abilities, too! And I later learned that my ring would have been a whole lot easier to do if I had chosen a cab with even dimensions, instead of this irregularly cut one - but I always go for the asymmetric stuff!

Getting these decorative balls in the shank of the ring was a pain!

Back view of the ring, showing my blatant rookie mistake: the back of the ring had to be stamped "sterling" before the shank was soldered on, and I placed the stamp in such a position that the solder flowed right over the "ster" in "sterling". So I guess my ring is just "ling"?


This was a project we were shown to use up the excess wire left over from the bangle; I only had enough excess to make a small pinkie ring!

And this is my big masterpiece - I am so pleased with the way it turned out. I used my own dichroic glass cabs, and designed this pendant to hang from an Omega or from a hard collar, and with a lot of direction from the teacher, it all came together very nicely!

I also started a 2nd pendant, and reticulated the silver links for a bracelet, but I couldn't finish either before I had to leave. And it will be awhile before I can finish either of them, because silversmithing is expensive! I want to order all the tools and equipment (not to mention, silver) that I need to start doing it right away, but lack the necessary fundage.

But hopefully my pal MAK (aka Glenda the Good Witch) will perfect the spell she is working on for me, and I will soon have money growing on trees, or something like that.

A girl can hope, anyway....

Collaboration, Part 2

Here is the second bracelet I wire-wrapped with SandFiber's gorgeous peyote beads,

Carol Dean wove the peyote beads with emerald-AB delicas, although they look more teal than emerald to me.

I added sterling silver rombo spacer beads, and then crafted the wire-wrapped bangle with sterling silver wire.





This beautiful bracelet will fit up to 6.75 inches, and is lightweight and flexible.

I have to thank CD for this fabulous idea - adding handmade beadwoven beads to a wire-wrapping project was genius! These two bracelets turned out great!