A 3 year (so far) Custom Project

This Project started about 3 years ago when a customer wanted a special chain made to celebrate her 88th birthday. We came up with a design that incorporated the 88 into a Mobius infinity band.  I made a heavy silver link chain to go with it. The next year we went to a smaller link about the size of the ones I made for the chain. The 89 posed some design problems but we came up with something slightly abstract with the 9 sort of flipped to balance the  shape within the frame of the link. This year we returned to the link size to make the link for 90 but the customer wanted some gold. She had the idea that the number should be the gold in the shape of the Roman Numeral for 90. I also made an extra link for everyday wear. www.jewelryartstudio.com

I also made an extra link for everyday wear

1800 Buckles

I started making buckles when I started making metal jewelry back in the late 70's.  I think the first one was made from scrape bronze banjo pieces from when I worked at Stewart MacDonald. I made several when I went to Penland in the 80's as "tech samples"  for the lamination techniques I learned with Chuck Evans  I didn't start keeping track of them until I started the series of Fish Face buckles in 1998. That's when I started numbering them. I passed #1800 right at the end of the year (2018) .  At the beginning of 2019 I started posting the buckles with the # of the number as of this writing I'm on #1868. This is the Farrier in sterling for 1 1/2 belts. I have been posting the sold buckles with their numbers  on www.Instagram.com/@jewelryartstudio I'm posting the front and back of each buckle as I finish them.  Most buckles don't get signed and numbered until they are sold.  They are all, so far, part of my inventory of designs so they can be ordered through my websites. If you follow # on instagram you can follow #petersenesacart and see paintings and jewelry in one place.

You can sign up for my occasional news letter (I'll let you ) at www.jewelryartstudio.com and click on the pop up

New Trout Money Clip

I finally finished the new version of my trout money clip. It's on my website and the Etsy store. What took so long? I'm not sure but probably everything else took priority. I started from scratch so I had to re carve the design.  I made it longer and heavier and thicker at the tail and face where it was bending too much  I also think I made it more realistic and true to the actual fish. This is hard to do sometimes because the proportions of the fish don't always fit into a money clip dimension.

It holds a few bills, business cards and credit cards

I like to use them to have cards at the ready

It wont take a big roll but if you only have a few bills they can fold up and it will still have plenty of grip

Silver Cups

Many years ago I went to 5 day beach parties for new years several years in a row.  During that time I started a tradition of making a new shot cup for the party. I have continued, over the years, to be interested in making silver cups. However not just for new years any more.  Sometimes for special occasions or gifts or just for the fun of it because I had an idea I wanted to exicute
Top left is the New Year Chaser.  This one was probably the most elaborate and complicated to make. It is a champagne cup on one end and a shot cup on the other. The double ended ball suspended in the middle "drops" when the cup is turned over, almost touching the point of the bottom cup but swinging clear.
On the right of the New Years Chaser is the Conch Cup.  Sea shells an sea life have always fascinated me (as you can tell by my website) This one is self explanatory but again, some tricky solder joins.  On of the most difficult things cannot even be seen in this shot.  The feet are tiny silver spirals that had to be soldered on near the end. Let's just say it's hard to solder something small to something big. 

 The Tornado cup and the Bubble cup are some of the early designs.  The tornado cup has gold balls swirling around the out side. This one proved to be difficult because it's one long piece of wire and that is one long solder joint to go top to bottom without any gaps or leaks and then soldering on the gold balls without re-flowing the whole thing was a challenge too. The "bubble" cup on the right was one of the first ones from the "beach party series".  I liked the idea of it looking like there is no bottom yet it holds a full once.  

The bubble cup on the left was done for the 4th of July. Again using the drilled out metal as a decorative design element.  I have used this technique on several jewelry pieces over the years.  On the right is a wedding cup done for a friend. They wanted lots of texture.  I like the little feet on this one

 This pair of shot cups are titled Scars and Strips
I used a course rasp file to get the texture on the out side and soldered on the copper and silver stripes cut from long strips of this material I made years ago for earrings and bracelet. That in it self is a good blog post.  Its a pretty involved process of soldering and rolling. These 2 were done for the fun of it but have been sold.

I used this "box making" technique to go a step further and make a tea ball.  I wrote a blog post on that one here.
 I don't have any of these on my Etsy store or website but if your interested in on just comment here or contact me  through the website 

Big Cuff Bracelets

These heavy sterling bracelets are designed for the rugged individual. I made them for the person who wants something totally unique but yet simple enough to wear comfortably with anything on a daily basis. The texturing is subtle but with age the contrast increases.  I used a textured hammer to create the surface forged them from 1/8 inch thick (4mm) square sterling rod and 3/16 (5mm) square rod.  No two are the same. These cuffs  are medium to large for men or women. They can be slightly adjusted if I know your wrist size. I wear one myself!
Available on the etsy store here

The process starts with a length of square sterling bar stock

This is about 1/2 way through the forging, at this point I'll start working on the ends and then bend it to the right shape

It takes a fairly heavy hammer to move this much silver

Some of the raw material and the bracelets in process

I made 2 of from the smaller 1/8 inch stock and one each of the heavier 5mm 3/16 stock.  the round rod in this picture were made into different designs not discussed here

This is the heavy 1/8 (5mm) cuff

Here I'm using the 2 different sizes of square silver to make these textured cuffs, 5mm and 4mm square rod.

 5mm square sterling rod forged

 thinner on top and wider on the ends

Available on the Etsy store

The 5 mm square rod with the textured finish. Available on the etsy store

2 of the lighter 1/8 square silver rod are on the etsy shop here There are one of each of the bigger designs

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

Forest Life pendant with sugilite and Amethyst

This pendant was made for my forest life series. I used a heavily hammer textured piece of silver for the backing. It reminded me of a leaf that had been on the ground for some time. I forged a silver wire into the shape of a curling vine. The round amethyst at the bottom to finish and give the eye a resting and a way to keep from going off the design.

Setting the big stone