A Photo!

Here it is, an in progress shot of the latest attempt. I am ridiculously proud of that bezel. Ridiculously. I luckily have a large amount of fine silver hanging around from a failed school project, and was able to mill out my own bezel wire. I don't want to have to apply too much pressure to the rutilated quartz when doing the final setting, so fine silver is my new best friend. Another reason I am so proud of this bezel, the stone actually snaps in. It's pretty much the best bezel I have ever made, and it's a non-round stone which makes that fact even cooler.

I'm going to solder on the three bars tomorrow when I'm not so tired, and get this thing pre-polished before attaching the hanging elements and chain. I'll have to wait on the final polish until next week at work, but in theory I could have a finished product as soon as Tuesday! I am pretty excited about this.

I have a station-style necklace for my next project. That will likely be something I will make more than one of, or do variations on it so each one will be a little unique. I've started cutting out components, but then realized I was using the wrong metal - nickel instead of sterling. Oh well, it was good practice; also showed me that I need to roll down the metal a bit otherwise these things are going to be boat anchors!

So, I have this rutilated quartz I bought a year ago. I had a design worked up for it last year, but never got around to it. Now with everything still finding its place in the new studio space, I pulled out that stone and the drawing...I don't like it anymore. We're doing something completely different.

So far I have a few of the parts ready to go, and am really liking this new idea. Need to solder the bezel into a continuous loop, then pop that onto some silver sheet, add the structural/design elements, and clean it all up. In theory this won't take very long, but I know better. I made extra parts in case of melting mishaps or other troubles. Hopefully I'll have some in-progress pictures to share soon.

Of course I have "help" from the new furry friends. They are still nameless, but they don't seem to mind. So far they're crazy, friendly, and most importantly healthy. They're quite fun, and I think they really like it here.