Custom Opal Earrings

This project came to me from a friend who had some opals that he bought a long time ago on a trip. He now wanted to make a pair of earrings for his wife. We weren't able to get together so this project was done totally online. I first did several sketches and narrowed that down to 4. Then I made a few sketches with wax wire to get it an idea of how the stores will work. I emailed the pictures and they picked the variation that they wanted. Now I was ready to translate the idea into silver. The trickiest part of this project was building a setting for the opal chunks at the top. I fabricated them from wire and made them look like they were suspended in the space. This whole piece so there was no casting involved.
It was done with round silver wire but I forged it down to get some taper and a little texture to the wire.
 She loved them! This was a custom project so it's not on my website.

The trickiest part of this project was building a setting for the opal chunks at the top

Suburban Tribal

New line of forged and hammer textured earrings, bracelets and pendants made of aluminium. Today I took some time to further develop this idea of very large earrings that are supper light weight. Keeping it simple by leaving coarse hammer marks and texturing helps to keep the price down and adds the intended funky look. They are still labor intensive but the aluminium takes the high price of silver out of the equation. It also allows for the bold statement with out the weight. These earrings are 2 to 3 inches or more yet feel weightless to wear.

They're fun to make too. You can really move some metal when the it doesn't put up much resistance  but they are very strong and durable and colorful.  I have added several to my display at the artisans' guild gallery.