Ye olde Worlde

Check out this great post about the jewellery quarter in Birmingham UK. The processes are pretty much unchanged in the last few hundred years really.

http://narrowboatcaxton.blogspot.com.au/2010/11/jewellery-quarter.html

Dan's Wedding ring

My brother Dan got married to the beautiful Kati on the weekend in Port Stephens on the NSW coast. It was an amazing weekend in a gorgeous location.
I was honoured to make Dan's wedding ring.

Dan is a cinematography based in Sydney. It was important to Dan that the ring be light weight, strong and comfortable. It has been years since Dan wore a ring due to the nature of his work. Cinematographers work with their hands all day long and in Dan's own words "I need the hardest metal in the world". That would be titanium.
The titanium ring shank is slightly tapered for comfort and the above image shows the materials I began with to make the ring, a titanium shank and the ingot of silver to be in-layed at a later stage...

Here is my bench. Firstly I gave it a bit of a tidy up. I like to do this before beginning a new process or project.

The required tools....

Before picking up any tools I masked out the ring with tape to protect the brushed surface as much as possible.

Here I am filing the inside of the ring to a comfort curved interior finish. I really love a curved interior profile as it increases the comfort and wearability of rings exponentially which was a number one requirement for my brother.

After filing out the bulk of the material with course and fine files, I then went on to polish the inside of the ring with small buffers.


This step is complete.

The next step is to get the silver inlay into the titanium. I re-mask the ring leaving a gap in the masking exactly where I want my inlay to be positioned. For this ring I chose to slightly off centre the inlayed strip.
Using a micro grinding wheel, I ground out a slot 1.5mm wide into the ring. This process took a while as accuracy in this process is absolutely crucial.

The piece of silver must be a tight and exact fit into the groove with some over lap to strike with the hammers. Once the piece of silver has been wedged ito the groove it is a matter of hammering and trimming the ingot until it has been planished into place. I have no images of the hammering because I was so absorbed with the making process that I didn't think to take any photos.

Finito!
CONGRATULATIONS DAN AND KATI Mwah!

Bowerbird Bazaar Design Market this weekend

If you are into shopping and love creative, beautifully designed things then get yourself to Adelaide for the Bowerbird Bazaar Design Market.

Queens Theatre, Playhouse Lane CBD

Friday 4.00pm - 9.00pm
Saturday 10.00pm - 5.00pm
Sunday 10.00pm - 4.00pm

Jewellery SA: The prognosis: dead or alive.

Jewellery SA: The prognosis: dead or alive.: Folowing on from the debate organised by RMIT Gold & Silversmithing dept "Is contemporary Jewellery Alive or Dead" the prognosis of the eve...

Jewellery SA: Is Contemporary Jewellery Alive or Dead?

The Jewellery SA group had it's 4th meeting last night at Gray Street Work shop. In Melbourne at the same time last night a lecture was being held at RMIT as a fundraiser for the RMIT Gold & Silversmithing 2011 graduate exhibition. Four internationally acclaimed luminaries of the jewellery world, goldsmith Robert Baines, artist and curator Susan Cohn, jeweller Benjamin Lignel, and art historian and curator Damian Skinner spoke on the topic, ‘The contemporary jewellery movement is more alive than dead’.
We thought it would be interesting to have a satellite discussion on the same topic because over the past ten years I have gnashed and grinded this topic to a pulp with my best friend and jeweller Jane Bowring. I really wanted other makers perspectives on how they view themselves and what Contemporary Jewellery means to them. Here are some of the thoughts that came up...

Jewellery SA: The Curio at Gaffa Gallery

Jewellery SA: The Curio at Gaffa Gallery: I have my work in the Gaffa retail space at the moment in a project devised by Zoe Brand called The Curio. Origami Bird Brooch Vintage t...

Pieces of Eight: PIECES OF FATE: Image Gallery

Pieces of Eight: PIECES OF FATE: Image Gallery: In this post we share with you a selection of beautiful images from Pieces of Fate , a new exhibition set to launch at Pieces of Eight Gall...

Pieces of Eight: Opening Night Recap: Pieces of Fate

Pieces of Eight: Opening Night Recap: Pieces of Fate: Many thanks to everyone who attended our opening last night for Pieces of Fate ! Even though winter has arrived early this year, we had a h...

Places & Spaces: Artist of the month - Kat Freene!

Places & Spaces: Artist of the month - Kat Freene!: Butterfly I first met Kat during an artist residency in the Metal Studio at the Jamfactory , Adelaide during 2003. Her work was always e...

Jewellery SA: Thankyou all who attended the first meeting for SA...

Jewellery SA: Thankyou all who attended the first meeting for SA...: "Thankyou all who attended the first meeting for SA jewellers. For those of you who couldn't make it the following notes are what were discus..."

Pieces of Eight: Piece of the day: TRUE ROMANCE

Pieces of Eight: Piece of the day: TRUE ROMANCE: "'Irish Claddagh' Ring: sterling silver. Wearing your heart on your sleeve is so passe, wear it on your finger instead! The work of Katri..."

Finders Keepers Feature Designer

Peggy Pearl: The Fabulous Finders Keepers

Peggy Pearl: The Fabulous Finders Keepers: "Mood: Antipodium maxi and layers of Nivea sunscreen to combat Sydney's sizzling summer sunshine. Every now and then, an inspiring encounter..."

West End Art Market

Myself and Ewa Card will have a stall in Leigh Street on Sunday the 19th of December. Should be fun!

I will be at Sydney Finders Keepers in December

The markets brings together new emerging and contemporary independent artists and designers of original and high creative standards. The markets brings together new contemporary independent artists and designers. Every market event is unique and we always rotate designers and introduce new ones, as well as featuring music from local independent musicians.

Christmas sale & Website Launch

You are invited to celebrate with Kath Inglis and Katrina Freene the much anticipated launching of their brand new websites created by Rachel Harris of Bit Scribbly Designs.

For lovers of hand crafted jewellery, come to the Wheaty on Saturday the 27th of November. Enjoy a champagne, do your chrissy shopping and then hang around for the cool bands afterwards.

All the jewellery on sale is hand made by the artists and are one-off pieces. Come early so you don't miss out!

Ho Ho Ho!

When: 2 - 6pm Saturday 27th November
Where: The Wheatsheaf Hotel, 39 George Street, Thebarton
(Bubbles and nibbles provided)




KATH INGLIS
Chinamans Hats Bangle
Hand Carved PVC + Sterling Silver



KATH INGLIS
Cloud Brooch
Hand Carved PVC + Sterling Silver




KATRINA fREENE
Necklace and earrings made from 70's biscuit tins

Jewellery photography

This set up looks even more professional than my dodgy attempts of photographing my own work. This image makes me feel better as there are other out there with make shift set up like me.

What to expect at Finders Keepers...

Circle drop Earrings
Made from 80's biscuit tin & stainless steel wire
$45.00

Wing earrings
Vintage tin & stainless steel wire
$80.00


Small butterfly brooch
Vintage biscuit tins & stainless steel wire
$80.00


Hi Tea Earring
70's vintage short bread tin & stainless steel wire
$60.00

Ribbon earrings
70's vintage short bread tin & stainless steel wire
$90.00
(I am not continuing with this style of earring. They are no fun for me to make... get them in Melbs in October while you can)

I will at Finders Keepers in Melbourne

This event is supposed to be massive, the line up looks awesome I am getting quite excited about it... hurray! Melbourne is super fun as well.

8th & 9th of October 2010
10 - 5pm

Shed 4 Victoria Harbour
North Wharf Road Docklands

Part A of making a cameo bangle

Here is an image of my bench. I am looking at a print off of profile shots of myself as a reference for doing the line drawing of the cameo to scale.



After drawing the cameo image to scale I then glued it onto a slab of carving wax.
I then scribed through the paper onto the wax. This image is of the wax after I have pulled off the paper line drawing.



Carving the wax...



This is after about 8- 10 hours of carving. I have polished the wax using terpentine and a rag and alot of patience.



I then cut and filed the wax and set it into a bought finding.

Part B of Making a Cameo Bangle

I had the wax and frame sent to the casters where I got it silicone moulded and cast in silver.



Bending and forming the shank from half round stock gauge silver



After filing and sanding the prongs to an elegant shape, I then gave an offering and a prayer to the soldering gods and hoped for the best. It worked. right on. The image here is the metal being cleaned in the pickle (a hot acid solution to clean the flux off).



Here is is clean and polished! I decided to polished the shank and leave the cameo matt white, which I achieved by heating and pickling the top of the piece repeatedly to bring up the fine silver to the surface.



After much faffing about with different finishes and techniques and having to re-polish and fine silver after every damned failed attempt at getting it looking the way I wanted...

I ended up painting the background black with enamel paint.

Done. Photographed. And now in a box under my bed. x

Studio Crash

5 days before moving my at home jewellery studio in to the fabulous share studio that is "Gate 8 Workshop" in Thebarton... All my shelves crashed to the floor. Fortunately I was not at my bench at that time. I was sitting in the room though... talking to a robotronic indian call centre dude from Telstra. I think it was sign.
The robotronic Indian dude didn't make a sale that day.
It was about 50 god damned degrees upstairs in that sweat box of a room, the shelves melted off the wall.
I love Gate 8.

Magnolia Square display

Young Blood Design Market this weekend

Meet and buy direct from the best new design talent in the country.

Featuring fashion, furniture, jewellery, graphics, industrial design and more, this curated market is a glimpse into the future, a critical launch pad for Australia’s talented young designers, as well as a vibrant market for the design-savvy shopper. Read the list of hot designers at Young Blood.

This year, Young Blood will be joined by the international designboom mart, featuring designers from around the world.

YOUNG BLOOD: DESIGNERS MARKET + DESIGNBOOM MART
Friday 13 August , 10am – 9pm
Saturday 14 and Sunday 15 August, 10am – 5pm
$5 entry (includes Museum admission) BOOK NOW
Free for Powerhouse members
Free for Sydney Design Pass holders

Young Blood is part of the Museum’s commitment to foster and promote Australian design.





Powerhouse Museum, 500 Harris St, Ultimo NSW powerhousemuseum.com