3 New Buckles Added to the Etsy Store

I recently added 3 new buckles to the ETSY store
 this is the 1 1/2 inch Arrow head buckle in bronze.  This is a wider version of the original 1.25 arrow head buckle carved down from the mold a found spear head.

This is the sterling version of the 1 1/2 inch  Megalodon sharks tooth . I molded it from an actual fossil tooth found in the Tampa Bay area by a customer who dove for it in an area that was about to be built over with a condo. It was on its way to the natural history museum for their collection but he let me borrow it for a few days to make a mold of the front of it. It's a beauty. This one is also for 1.5 inch belts. I do a bronze and white bronze version of this but this is the first sterling one.

This is the white bronze version of the lab buckle for 1.25 belts.  I have done this design in bronze and sterling so this is first successful white bronze casting.  White bronze is harder to cast because of the pitting that occurs on the castings,  It's very difficult to get a perfect casting in white bronze in this design, but this one came pretty close

Picking Up Sticks: Aleatoric Design

"Aleatoricism is the incorporation of chance into the process of creation, especially the creation of art or media"  (Wikipedia). Aleatoric design technique is something I have used a lot over the years in my jewelry and painting.  I never knew there was a name for it, other than randomness, until Ted Lincoln told me about Aleatoric design.
 I had the occasion to make 4 of these Pick Up Sticks necklaces for a gallery, Beaufort River Glass  that carries some of my work and I thought it might be interesting to show the process.  The original idea came from a random arrangement of parts on my bench. I was making earrings and I liked the way several of the same part randomly arranged themselves on the bench.  It made an interesting design.  With a bit of re arranging and some engineering,  I came up with something that I could reproduce with some fidelity without changing the original idea too much and yet each one is different.
 The process may be fairly obvious.  I make the parts and solder them together. ( I always love instructions like that.  How to make jewelry: make parts and solder them together) I make the parts by forging out round wire and melting the end with the torch. I  make the final assembly in 2 layers and then solder the layers together.  However the parts are never the same length nor do they develop the same curve when hammering or melt to the same length so besides the chance in the design there is also some randomness in the parts. They end up being about 2 inches wide and 2 inches long.
 these are on my website here.

Parts of wire cut and shaped and starting to forge the ends

Using a slightly domed face hammer to forge out the ends of the wire.  I like the domed face in this case because of the dent it makes.  A more flat face would make a less noticeable dent so the whole piece would be smoother

Melting the ball on the end.  This is why all the shapes don't end up the same length.

Starting the assemblage of the parts to get the design arrangement.  At this point I start to solder them together

4 variations on the theme

 After soldering and several steps of grinding and sanding they come to the buffing wheel for the final high polish before assembling with black cotton cord or sterling chain.

Variation one. This is the basic design and the one I do the most. I can come prety closr to this each time I do them now

This is variation 2. There is still differences between each piece but I come close enough to these 3 every time. Each one is unique 

This is variation 3 . These are the 3 main variations that come out of this design. Which one is your favorite? all three are available here

Elks Teeth Jewelry

This project stated when  customer came to me with these elks teeth. Souvenirs from a hunting trip. The idea is to make a pendant and a pair of earrings 

These are the natural teeth as I received them

I reshaped them and sanded the bottoms flat in preparation of setting them.

Here the wax models are ready to cast.  The teeth can't be heated up so they have to be removed from the wax for the next step

The wax has been transformed into silver and the and the teeth are being adjusted to get the fit back in the cup.

The finished product. . If you have an idea for a project contact me here

If I had a hammer

Using my big textured face cross peen hammer, I forged out these tapered sterling rods. 2 are going to be bracelets and the the 3rd (first picture) is going to be part of a pendant.

Some of the other one off pieces being worked on at the same time