IMPORTANT! PLEASE MAKE SURE YOU DO NOT CLAIM GIFT AID ON THIS. IT IS NOT CLASSED AS ELIGIBLE UNDER HMRC RULES BECAUSE THERE IS A PRIZE INVOLVED.
I am currently raffling this original solid silver mini picture of a moon gazing hare to raise funds for the DEC Gaza Appeal. The appeal is to raise funds for families who have lost everything and currently have no shelter, food, or access to basic life essentials and are living in intolerable conditions. It is not a political statement it is a humanitarian appeal.
The picture measures approximately 80 x 50 mm and weighs in at over 40g of sterling silver.
I made it using the traditional technique of chasing and repousse, which employs hammers and punches to stretch and shape the metal to form the detail of the picture. It’s usual retail price is £225 but you could be the lucky owner by winning the raffle!
For a donation of £5 to my Justgiving page you get a “virtual raffle ticket” entered into the draw, £10 gets you 2 entries and so on. The draw will be held on 31st August.
If you do donate then please be sure to leave your name on your donation at Justgiving, and also email me on [email protected] so I can get in touch with you if you’re the lucky winner!
A heartwarming tale about commissioning designer jewellery!
Last year I was asked to design 3 matching silver pendants for 3 sisters. Their Mum wasn’t sure exactly what she wanted, she knew she’d like the pendants to make some sort of special design when all 3 were put together, so I came up with these – 3 pendants set with birthstones which formed a heart when they all came together – to represent the bond between the 3 girls.
The three pendants, set with birthstones, form a heart when put together to represent the bond between the 3 sisters.
With the design accepted, I made the silver pendants, Christmas Day arrived and everyone was happy! The girls were delighted with their designer jewellery, and their Mum was so excited to have given them a unique gift full of meaning!
Well, with Mother’s Day approaching the girls pulled a surprise on their Mum and asked me to make a piece of designer jewellery especially for her. The design mirrors the heart element of their pendants, and is set with opal – her birthstone and engraved on the reverse with their names.
The silver heart pendant set with an opal birthstoneThe 3 daughters’ names engraved on the reverse
The heart on this pendant matches the heart that the daughters’ pendants form – this represents their love for a very special Mum. I have been bursting with excitement over this commission, and have been so looking forward to finally seeing the reaction from the lucky lady herself. Well the waiting is finally over – she has just tweeted me a picture of her pendant on top of all the pendants together – I think she’s just a bit of a happy Mum.
So, why not give it a go? You could get your own perfect piece of unique designer jewellery, beautifully made and full of meaning too.
All the pendants together forming a great big heart!
I’ve sometimes been accused of being indecisive. There- I admitted it! In my defence sometimes I am faced with just too many choices- I have been known to spend a full 5 minutes staring helplessly at the coffee shelf in the supermarket unable to make the final decision over Italian Roast, French full bodied, or Lazy Sunday style coffee. So you can imagine what I get like when faced with LOADS of beautiful stones to set in rings….
Gorgeous stones for the silver skinny rings
Yesterday, I was faced with such a choice – rhodonite, turquoise, carnelian or rhodocrosite (err, that translates as dark pink, turquoise, orangey red or light pink!!!), and then it came to me – don’t decide – make them all, and my new skinny rings were born!
These handmade silver rings are made from sterling silver “pearl” wire which is one of my favourites and makes such a beautiful feature, and topped off with a small (but perfectly formed!) stone – they are definitely my new favourite piece of designer silver jewellery! I’ll be teaming these up with some skinny silver bands, so keep an eye on the blog for news of when these are going into my online shop.
Are there any other colours that you’d like to see these in? (My indecisiveness is creeping in again….!)
The great thing about these rings is that they are skinny enough to stack with other rings, or beautiful enough to wear alone, and will definitely be affordable enough to choose several in different colours – so you see – you don’t have to choose just one after all!!!
Hello! Who needs cheering up? Well, me for a start…. too many dreary dark wet days for my liking, and not enough of the freezing cold sparkly ones that make your spirit soar and your cheeks rosy pink!
You could win this handmade silver cocktail ring!
I think there’s nothing like a good giveaway to raise the spirits, so I decided that one of my uber-glamorous handmade silver cocktail rings might just do the trick. There’s no catch – one lucky person will be drawn at random from the entrants, and they will win one of these rings made to their ring size, by my own fair hands. I’ll even put it in a pretty box and pay the postage.
All you have to do to enter is leave me a comment at the end of this blog – that means I will have your email address, so I can contact you if you are the super duper lucky winner! Closing date for entries is Sunday 16th February at 6pm, and the winner will be notified the following day. There is no cash alternative to the prize.
So go ahead people – leave me a comment – why not tell me what colour stone you want in your ring if you win? Or even tell me a joke!!!
You can choose from these stones for your handmade silver cocktail ring if you’re the lucky winner!
So, things have been pretty busy here in the run up to Christmas at Lucylou Designs; making orders for lots of lucky people to receive as gifts, and typically this is when I seemed to have lots of inspiration for designs, but no spare time to try them out.
After the last Christmas posting date was past, it was all systems go to make this little chap who I have been looking forward to creating for ages now! Meet Noel – a little silver hare adorned with 24 carat gold symbols – I made him just in time to celebrate the winter solstice on 21st December. Hare design ready to pierce out from the silver sheet
Noel is made from sterling silver sheet – carefully cut out with a piercing saw, then filed and sanded to refine and perfect the edges. He was looking pretty handsome at this stage, and then I employed the ancient Korean method of Keum Boo to apply the 24 carat gold symbols to him. Silver hare cut out and ready to add the 24ct gold
Pure gold (24ct) and pure silver have a similar crystal structure, and so under the correct conditions of heat and pressure it is possible to get them to bond together at a molecular level. The gold symbols on Noel are applied in this way – so they are not stuck on – they are absorbed into the surface of the metal and become part of it.
Preparing the sterling silver for Keum Boo involves forming a layer of pure silver on the surface – this is done by repeatedly heating and “pickling” the sterling silver in acid – usually a minimum of 7 times. The 24ct gold foil is then carefully applied to the silver, and it is heated to approximately 400 degrees C using a blowtorch. Now for the tricky bit…. When the silver is upto temperature pressure is applied to the gold foil by rubbing with an agate burnisher until the bonding is complete. I don’t have any photos for this part of the process as it takes two hands to do this part – I’ll rope in someone to take some snaps next time.
Noel – the finished Keum Boo silver hare pendant
After cleaning the piece up, some jump rings were soldered on to the back so Noel could be hung from a chain. I know I’m biased, but he’s such a handsome chap!
I spent a fantastic day at The Waterhall, Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery today, as an exhibitor at the Guild of Jewellery Designer’s show. The location was stunning and the work from the designers there was equal to it. Out of all those designers every one of them seemed to bring a different skill or angle to their handmade jewellery, so much amazing variety!
I was pleased to find a few little silver hares dotted around the exhibition – turns out I’m not the only designer who loves them!!!
I was lucky enough to recently spend a weekend with Teresa Speer – an inspirational jeweller and lecturer, and Peter Johns – lecturer and very clever man who invented Argentium Silver.
Between them they showed me how to work with this special silver, and how to make the most of its unique and amazing properties.
Teresa Speer and Peter Johns at In The Studio Jewellery School
What is Traditional Sterling Silver?
Traditional sterling silver is an alloy – containing 92.5% pure silver, and 7.5% copper. The copper gives it its hardness, and allows us to wear it as long lasting jewellery – without the copper pure silver is too soft and is damaged by day to day wear. Unfortunately the copper also causes some problems –
Tarnish – copper reacts with the atmosphere and perspiration to produce a dull dirty layer
Metal Allergies – copper is thought to be the trigger for many metal allergies people have to gold and silver, as it is present in both.
Firestain – a dull blue / grey bloom that you may see in patches on silver. It is due to the copper absorbing oxygen and forming copper oxide (which is black) when the silver is heated. The copper oxide sinks into the top layers of the silver, and it can only be removed by many hours of filing and polishing. (Not my favourite job – but necessary to finish the piece to a high standard!)
In mass-produced commercial products sometimes the firestain is removed using highly toxic chemicals including cyanide, but more often it is not removed and they are silver or rhodium plated to disguise it, but as the plating wears off it becomes disappointingly visible. The blotches on the silver urn pictured below are firestain.
“Paul Revere, Jr.: Hot-water urn (1990.226a-d)” In Timeline of Art History New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art https://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/rvre/ho_1990.226a-d.htm (September 2008)
What is Argentium Silver?
It is purer than traditional sterling silver as it contains 93.5% pure silver. It still contains a small amount of copper, but some of this has been replaced with a metal called germanium. The germanium forms a tough and transparent layer near the surface of the silver which prevents the copper from reacting with the atmosphere. This means that Argentium silver is –
Tarnish resistant – In industry approved tests Argentium silver was shown to much more resistant to tarnishing than traditional sterling silver, meaning that your jewellery stays brighter and cleaner for much longer.
Hypoallergenic – It can be worn without adverse reaction by many people who have allergies to gold and silver
No Firestain – The germanium prevents the formation of copper oxide, so no unsightly firestain is formed.
Additional benefits of the Argentium Silver include
Stronger – It can be hardened so it’s stronger than sterling silver weight for weight allowing the making of lighter more delicate but strong pieces of jewellery
Greener– It’s made from 100% recycled silver so it’s kinder to the environment.
Brighter – It is a whiter coloured metal – closer to the colour of pure silver, and whiter than either white gold or traditional sterling silver.
Argentium Silver Ring
Argentium silver is fully hallmarkable – so you can still have your guarantee of quality – it will be marked as sterling silver and can also bear the additional flying unicorn hallmark of Argentium silver. It is becoming increasingly popular for wedding rings, driven by the trend for white metals, and its superior bright white colour. As the makers of Argentium say –“if silver is the new gold…. Argentium is the new silver!”
I wanted to show you the stages involved in making this unique bangle – I hope you enjoy it!
This bangle is for a 21st birthday gift, and has 21 rings on it – such a lovely idea! If I had my age in rings on the bangle I don’t think you’d be able to lift it, or I would need a security escort with all that silver!
Making the Silver Rings
First the rings are formed out of 3 different types of silver wire. They are wrapped tight around a mandrel to make a coil, then using my trusty saw, I cut through the coil (and hopefully not my fingers) to form individual rings. The rings are then soldered shut, before perfecting their shape by hammering them on a mandrel using my rawhide hammer. Then the rings are filed and sanded to make them smooth and perfect.
Texturing the silver rings
In this bangle the rings are all different patterns, so they are then put back onto the mandrel, and hammered using a metal hammer to texture or flatten the silver.
Shaping the silver bangleThe main bangle is made from 3mm round silver wire. The length of wire is hammered around a bangle mandrel to give it a uniform round shape. When I am completely happy with the bangle I slide the rings on, and carefully solder the bangle shut. It is then tapped round the mandrel again to ensure it is perfectly round.
Perfecting the bangle
The bangle is then sanded again, and ready for a final polish, with 2 types of polish. Finally – the finished article is ready to give as a fabulous gift!
Nothing cheers me up like a sale! So when I realised that the sunny weather had deserted the North of England for the Bank Holiday Monday, I decided to try and cheer you all up too!
Hurry up and use your coupon quickly – it is only a 48 hour sale.
Use coupon code FLASH10 at checkout to get 10% discount on all jewellery for orders over £25. There doesn’t that feel better?!
If you follow my blog you will have noticed that I am keen on recycling. I recently set myself a scrap pot challenge -to design and produce a piece of handmade silver jewellery using only my scrap pot contents. I outperformed and made 4 delicate silver rings and 2 pairs of beautiful textured silver earrings!
Now recycling and reusing is common place in everyday life, so why are we still making so much of our silver jewellery out of newly mined silver? Mining negatively impacts the environment, workers and surrounding communities, so it makes sense to reuse what we have already dug up right?
Although it makes perfect sense until now it has been really difficult to source a supplier of eco-friendly silver for jewellery making in the UK. Recently Cookson Gold started to supply eco gold, and now *HURRAY* they are about to do the same with silver.
I will continue to use recycled silver in my handmade jewellery as much as possible, and think the scrap pot challenge will become a regular event – and your comments on some design themes for that challenge would be very welcome!
I’m looking forward to sharing my greener handmade silver jewellery with you!
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