Learn to Make Jewellery - Chesham and Reading - some student work

Below are some a small selection of photos of work that my students have made recently. This term, we have worked on making a box. These are two copper boxes made with a friction fit lid and a simple hinge: 

Maureen and Ruth

This is a silver cuff bracelet made by Gill in her first term!

Gill

This is a silver ring with a bezel set trillion purple cz made by Emma. She made her own bearer wire for this project.

Emma

This truly was a labour of love. Made over several terms, this elaborate sculpture....well, it's a brooch, but it truly is a miniature sculpture......is made of copper and brass. The copper was etched and the pieces are at different heights, held up by pegs.

Amy - 1

Here it is from the side so you can see the elevations.

Amy - 2

This too was a labour of love, mostly because it involved a LOT of annealing. This 8cm silver bowl has a textured inside and a burnished edge.

Jayne

Another labour of love....an epic project involving specially made toads from Ukraine! Amazing twisted wire cuff bangle. Many tests were done with various wires before the right combination was found!

Julie

And last, but certainly not least, silver basket set cz cabochons earrings - isn't that colour great!?

Victoria

Fancy trying some jewellery making yourself?

Jewellery Classes in Chesham, Buckinghamshire

Be guided through a series of projects progressing to designing and making your own individual jewellery. No experience or artistic skills are necessary. Classes are for both beginners and those with experience. The course provides a range of hand tools and access to equipment. You will be introduced to the tools and given full instruction in the use of tools & equipment as the course progresses. Students can choose to work either in silver or they can work in copper or brass. Silver and other metals are not included in the cost. You will be given instruction in how to purchase your own materials.

Tuesday 9:30am-3:00pm (next 11 week session starts 30 April 2019) £284

Tuesday 5:00pm-7:00pm (next 11 week session starts 30 April 2019) £113

Tuesday 7:30pm-9:30pm (next 11 week session starts 30 April 2019) £113 FULL THIS TERM

To book, please click on this link to Buckinghamshire Adult Learning or call 01296 382403.


Jewellery class on Wednesday evenings at Maiden Erlegh School in Reading

18:45 – 21:15 Wednesday evenings – intermediate/advanced jewellery class – next 8 week session starting 1 May 2019 £84

Continue learning silver jewellery making with an emphasis on more challenging projects. Students will be guided through a series of projects or a single more complex project. The focus will be on developing skills, so the class is for learners with some experience, but basic techniques will be reviewed as necessary. We will cover techniques including but not limited to stone setting and complex soldering. Full instruction in the use of tools and equipment will be given. Students can work in silver or copper or brass.

To book, please go to this link: www.maidenerleghschool.co.uk/page/?title=How+to+Book&pid=131

Learn to make your own silver jewellery

Learn to make your own silver jewellery! Start the new year with something fun and social. Jewellery classes start next week, 8 January in Chesham, Buckinghamshire.

Jewellery Classes in Chesham, Buckinghamshire


I teach day and evening classes in Chesham.

Be guided through a series of projects progressing to designing and making your own individual jewellery. No experience or artistic skills are necessary. Classes are for both beginners and those with experience. The course provides a range of hand tools and access to equipment. You will be introduced to the tools and given full instruction in the use of tools & equipment as the course progresses. Students can choose to work either in silver or they can work in copper or brass. Silver and other metals are not included in the cost. You will be given instruction in how to purchase your own materials.

Tuesday 9:30am-3:00pm (next 11 week session starts 8 January 2019) £347 ONE PLACE LEFT

Tuesday 5:00pm-7:00pm (next 11 week session starts 8 January 2019) £139 SEVERAL PLACES LEFT

Tuesday 7:30pm-9:30pm (next 11 week session starts 8 January 2019) £139 FULL

To book, please click on this link to Buckinghamshire Adult Learning or call 01296 382403.

Setting for small stones in my jewellery classes in Great Missenden

As part of exploring basket (or prong, or claw) setting, I showed one of my jewellery classes how to make this small basket setting, which is well suited to small stone around the 3-6mm range. You can find a full tutorial on this blog, which explains it very well: http://fluxplay.blogspot.co.uk/2010/07/make-your-own-claw-setting.html 
I made two samples - a 4mm cz with the basket made from 0.5mm wire and a 6mm rose quartz with the basket made from 0.8mm wire. The one my student made was 5mm with 0.8mm wire - and it looks great! It's the one with the bail, my two samples are either side of it in the two lower photos.

(Please ignore the terrible state of my fingernails, that's a result of filing and sanding all the time!)

Jewellery classes in Berkshire and Buckinghamshire

I have been busy teaching and making new jewellery! The new jewellery hasn't been photographed yet, so that will be coming up. In the meantime, a bit about the teaching.

I'm still teaching in Buckinghamshire - at Great Missenden. There are termly classes and Saturday classes for Bucks Adult Learning. There are also weekend courses and a summer 2 day course for the Missenden School of Creative Arts. For both, you can see details on my website: www.machidewaard.co.uk/classes

In November, I taught a private lesson in my studio in Reading: Introduction to Silver Jewellery Making. The results were three rings - a wide one with leaf texture, a twisted wire one and a wave ring.

Also in November, I taught another introductory course in Chesham where the students made a textured wide ring and a wave ring:

Two of those students came for a private lesson in January, and we made jewellery with bezel set cabochon stones:

In the termly classes (now at Great Missenden), we continue making interesting jewellery and working on things like Keum Boo technique (gold foil fusing) and stone setting (such as basket setting). This student made a silver saftey pin:

And here are some examples of student work on basket setting for cabocons and also earrings made with copper and silver:

Summer Course at South Hill Park

There are still a couple of spaces left on my summer course at South Hill Park! See here for details: http://tiny.cc/i1gb8
It's a three day course from Tue 17 Aug - Thu 19 Aug 10.00am - 4.00pm each day.

random wishlist

There are approximately 10,202,395,385,103,204 different types of skills in silversmithing/jewellery making. As soon as I learn one, I find another two I'd like to learn. Some are more appealing than others, and some I'm happy to get an expert to do, since they are their own specialised fields. Many types of stone setting, for example, I feel are better left to the experts. They are going to do a better job and a good job straight away because they do it all the time. However, there are things that I'm just interested in and someday I'm going to get around to getting some lessons or demos, or at very least some videos! I'm not counting bezel setting as stone setting, for some reason, probably because I can do that and it usually involves quite large stones (or stones that aren't faceted, anyway).

Here's a random wish list of skills I'd like to learn:
1. engraving (see previous post about drooling over hand engraver's course)
2. granulation (this intrigues me and luckily I know a jeweller who knows a thing or two about this, so it's not a pipe dream to learn more)
3. stone setting (yes yes I said I'd rather leave to the experts, but I'd like to be better at doing gypsy settings and possibly roman settings. I like the flush style of setting as opposed to prong settings.)
4. enamelling (I'm sort of interested in this because of the colour options, but then sort of not because of all the extra tools I would need)

Anyway....that is what's on my mind at the moment.