The making of a silver mini locket with a gold ball

Lockdown 2.0 projects! I've been working on a mini locket. Below are the progress photos and also photos of the finished item!

This is the locket before any findings were added:

 And here we have the beginning of the hinge:

 

 

This photo shows the first two side knuckles of the hinge, each about 1mm wide.

  

 

This photo shows the hinge with the middle knuckle now also attached.   

 

 

Here is the tiny bit of tube being soldered on to make the clasp on the other side of the locket:

 

 

 

This is the beginnings of the part of the clasp that will hold the locket shut.

 

  

 

This is the locket before finishing and before the hinge has been properly finished with a rivet.

 

 

Finally, here we have the finished locket. It is a mix of argentium and sterling silver, with an 18ct gold ball embedded in the front which is also visible from the inside. The silver has a brushed finish. And the cat is my parents' cat, Miles, because why not?

New Jewellery on Not on the High Street

 I've been tidying up my Not on the High Street shop by adding new packaging and gift tag options. I also added these four new pairs of earrings:

 

Update on Silver Jewellery Making book and other things

 I'm delighted to be part of the Craft Council Directory - a fabulous list of many of the amazing makers in the UK across many disciplines. The link is: https://www.craftscouncil.org.uk/directory/machi-de-waard-jewellery

In book news, Silver Jewellery Making is nearing completion. By completion, I mean nearing the end of many, many stages of editing. We're down to the nitty gritty now!!! The marketing team have made this lovely leaflet:

 

 

I'm working on some new pieces - namely five pendants - which I will hopefully have photos of soon. 

Silver Jewellery Making book

Janet and I have been hard at work trying to make our book, Silver Jewellery Making, the best it can possibly be. Yesterday we had the last photo shoot at our publisher, Search Press. We added extra images to clarify some techniques and took many photos of tools to show them more clearly. We also added more images to properly illustrate our "how to design" chapter. The photographer, Mark, did an amazing job. Between him and the design direction from Search Press, the tools were turned into works of art! Below are a selection of photos from the day. The cupcake snuck in there because one of the team at Search Press had a special birthday and we luckily got to join in with the cake! The book is coming together well and I really hope that by the time it's published in February 2021, we will be able to throw a big party and invite loads of people!

cupcake

Files made to look beautiful!

the propane torch gets its time in the limelight (although all the projects in the book are done with a handheld torch, we wanted to show different torch options).

tools and the big lights for the photos

silver being photographed

lace bangles

At the beginning of lockdown, I worked on several jewellery projects that had been languishing as low priority items on my bench for quite a while. One of these was a lace imprint bangle. A while ago, I made this bangle with three little claps that were meant to be reminiscent of a corset fastening:

Hm, I can see my photography skills have improved since then as well, ha! Anyway...I had been thinking for ages that I wanted to improve on the clasps with a slightly different look and a better solution for soldering them (if you look very closely at the above bangle, you can see the solder join on the wire clasp bits isn't quite rounded at one part). So, I finally got around to it and was very pleased with the result. It looks like this:

There's an inside lip under the clasp to make it really smooth on the inside for comfortable wearing. The clasps are easier to use because they have a little bobble on them, plus I like the look of them! It's quite an old fashioned clasp, often used on the side of bracelets as an extra safety clasp to make sure it can't open and fall off.

Also, I've joined Instagram, find me there: @machi_jewellery

Jewellery made by my students

This term has abruptly ended because of the current virus situation, so I thought I would share some photos of jewellery made by my students in Chesham and Reading this term.

Made by Gill: hammered texture napkin ring

Made by Jane: matching set of earrings and ring with bezel set agate cabochons

Made by Kirsty: punch pattern silver cuff bracelet

Made by Natalie: small bezel set onyx stud earrings

Also Natalie: a rather fabulous rectangle statement necklace. Although it did get amended later because it didn't hang quite right, but I don't have a photo of the updated version!

Made by Rachel: a ring with a large, beautiful stone and on a double ring shank beneath.

Also made by Gill: a swirl of silver wire necklace

Made by Ruth: a very impressive small box with friction fit lid and tree and leaf decorations in brass.

Made by Sarah: a large checkerboard cut stone ring. The stone has subtle colour changes in the light.

Made by Maureen: an impressive cuff bracelet with a simple and elegant result that took quite a lot of effort!

Made by Cora: a very impressive square box with bezel set coral cabochons. Nobody ask how long this took!!!

Made by Helena: elegant moonstone cabochon cufflinks.

Made by Tony: two tube settings on a d-shape ring shank.

Made by Jo: a successful bezel set rose quartz ring.

Made by Gill: bezel set small oval amethyst dangle earrings.

Made by Cora: unusual stone bezel set with decorative gallery wire. Don't mention the melted ones!

Made by Victoria: fun and effective school of fish silver cuff bangle.

Made by Sarah: a brilliant result - hinged square locket with clasp!

Made by Cathy: fabulous rectangular box with friction fit lid.

Made by Susanna: hammer texture pendant with blue cabochon stone.

Made by John: twisted wire rings.

Made by Gill: I forget the name of these things - silver twist and pin to hold a knitted cardigan together.

Made by Jane: ammonite bezel set from the back (this is the front).