I adore jewellery; I love gold and silver, the warmth, the depth of tone, the fact gold never tarnishes and gems which are sparkly and almost otherworldly. I wonder…? Could I have a go at making it myself? Some people do - I’m pretty resourceful, practical and creative. Now, where to start?
There’s a one day course with a reputable jeweller to make a silver bezel set ring…she’s got one space left! Bag it! Oh wow, this is exciting. I’m booked for 19th June 2021 and can’t wait to see if I can make a ring myself!
I’ve been waiting a couple of weeks for my course to start and in the meantime I’ve bought some books on silversmithing to at least learn the theory. That way I won’t look a complete idiot and not know one end of a torch from the other. It’s so tempting to start buying some tools, but I need to be patient and wait and see if I like making jewellery. More to the point, I need to make sure that I can actually do this. I might melt the silver, I might set fire to the workshop! God, I hope not!
Today’s the day and I’ve got Emma’s workshop in my Sat Nav, so I know where I’m going, ready for the 10am start. I’m a bit nervous - I don’t really know what to expect but I’ve got to make a leap into the unknown. Look at it this way, it’ll be a learning experience. I might well learn that I can buy jewellery but not necessarily make it!
Emma’s really, really welcoming and has a gorgeous workshop with individual benches and equipment, so I’ve got my own bench to work at. We’re still being very Covid secure so I have to work with a mask on but thankfully it’s not a really hot day. There are five other ladies here who seem to know what they’re doing, so I’m going to seem a bit more confident than I actually feel!
I’ve decided on making a thick ‘gauge’ silver ring with an amethyst - it’s the kind of ring I’d like to eventually make in gold so it seems like a good idea to do it under the supervision of an excellent tutor. The silver is 6mm by 2mm rectangular wire with an 8mm by 5mm deep purple cabochon (flat bottomed) amethyst. So here I go! Emma’s great; she takes us step by step through the first process, which is to shape my silver around a mandrel (long pointing stick that gradually gets thicker) by giving it several wacks with a hide hammer. That stops me making big dents in the silver apparently. A ring! I’ve got to solder the ends together, but it’s starting to look like a ring!
Phew, it’s lunchtime and I’m getting some air. I’ve loved every minute of this morning. It took a lot of heat to get the solder to flow onto the silver as my wire was very thick but Emma told me exactly where to position her torch and how to heat the whole ring first. It’s like magic when the solder flows and turns to liquid, oozing into the very thin crack and making it look like one piece of silver. This is addictive! Becoming a jeweller is definitely what I want to do!
This afternoon has been making the bezel for the stones, soldering onto the backplate and watching the magic flow. Then it’s a case of filing down the edges and making the bezel cup look like it’s all one piece of silver. It’s going to take some doing to get this ring finished by 5 O’Clock, but Emma seems pretty confident. While we wait for the different stages to pickle to clean the silver after soldering, I’ve been looking at some of Emma’s books. I’m like a kid in a sweet shop and I feel…how do I feel? At home. That’s how I feel. Like I was meant to do this.
We’ve soldered the bezel cup onto the ring shank and it’s starting to look like a proper ring. I still haven’t set the stone yet and it’s half past four, but apparently that’s normal. Setting the stone is the absolute last thing to be done. I’ve popped the amethyst in and it still fits, so that’s good! Rock and push the silver over the stone at the points of a compass and keep going, more sanding and burnishing around the stone and voila! I’ve made a silver bezel set ring!
