Pandora Style Charms

I was recently asked to make one of my little silver bee charms to fit on a Pandora bracelet.

I carved a little ring from wax with an inside diameter of 4mm, to fit on the Pandora chain, and had it cast.  I had a mould made too, just in case anyone else ever asks me for one!

 

And here is my little bee:

 

I think it turned out really well – I might offer the ‘Pandora Style’ option for some of my other charms.

New Commission

I was recently asked to make one of my custom initial necklaces in gold - eek!  Working with gold always scares me.  It's silly really, it's no more difficult than working in silver but it's just the expense of the materials if it all goes wrong!

Anyway, my customer liked the Ornate font that I use, so here is the little gold initial - it's 15mm wide.

On the Workbench

You may have noticed that I appear to have done a bit of a disappearing act from my blog recently.  I have been a little bit swamped with work, hence not really having time to write about it!

Here’s a couple of shots of the current chaos of my workbench.

   

See, working really hard!

More roller derby goodness soon :)

Custom Roller Derby Helmet

I was recently asked to make a custom silver jammer helmet necklace, complete with the skater number, for a skater in Australia.

Slightly randomly, she actually skates in a league with one of my old team mates from London Rollergirls!

And here it is:

I didn’t have time to set up my lights and photograph properly, so I just took a quick shot with Instagram on my phone.  Turned out okay actually!

Took Some Pictures...

Having recently got a rather bargainous second hand Canon 15-85 lens, I thought I'd have a go at actually leaving my house with the camera.  The only thing I know how to take pictures of is jewellery, which just sits there quietly being small and annoyingly reflective.  So, I joined a camera club.  Actually I joined a while ago, this is just the first time I've been brave enough to actually go on a shoot. You have to talk to strangers, it's scary!

Anyway, they were doing a themed shoot called Rock n' Roll bride, I though it sounded fun so I went along. 

It feels a bit strange waving a camera at people, but they're models, they're used to it!  There was a mixed range of abilities there, a fair few of my fellow clueless but also people with those fancy white lenses and flash gun/mini umbrella combos.

Given my lack of knowledge, I don't think my pictures turned out too bad actually! 

Here's some of my favourites: 

 

It was actually pretty fun - not sure I really learned anything technical, but it was good to just have experience of taking a ton of pictures of stuff.  I might try a studio lighting workshop next time, so I know how to take pictures of my jewellery on models at some point in the future, when I build my new website.  After I've done all the other million things I need to do first! 

Custom Silver Meat Cleaver Charm

I've been sooooooo busy recently I've hardly had time to post here at all, but trying to do it more regularly.

Had a really fun commission last week to make a meat cleaver charm as a leaving present for a roller derby league's coach.  He's a butcher and they wanted to incorporate his skate number, 8oz into it.

Actually remembered to do some work in progress shots for once!  Started with flat silver sheet, and cut out the basic shape, before filing down the blade part so that the handle was thicker.  I wanted it to look like a very traditional cleaver, so I drilled some holes to hammer rivets through at the end. 



I've been trying to have a bit of a go at simple engraving recently, so decided to engrave a wood texture on the handle - turned out quite well actually, although you can't really see it in this picture!  Also filed a bevel for the edge of the blade.



Cut out the really tiny skate number.  That was fun. 

All ready for soldering:

And all finished and polished up, with the rivets hammered through the handle!

 
Cute, huh?

Right, back to the workbench - I have wedding jewellery to finish off and a ton of shiny roller derby related things to get done. 

Custom Silver Mini-Bee Bracelet

Given all my recent witterings about furniture and fancy gardens, you may have forgotten that I do actually make the odd shiny thing.

Had a recent commission to make one of my mini-bees into a bracelet with a little yellow citrine gemstone honey drop.

And here it is!

A little close up:



Not terribly good pictures I'm afraid, I just took them in the workshop without using my usual lighting or diffusers, but you get the idea.

Another custom thing coming very soon....