Contrariwise ramblings

I don't know if you remember, but earlier this year, I posted a tutorial on how to wrap briolette beads.

I just recently got an interesting e-mail from a fellow jewelry maker. She said that wrapping briolettes was information that she worked hard to discover herself and that it was hard-earned; she was upset that I was sharing it. She called me out on her blog, too.

Well do you know what I say. Knowledge is worthless unless it is shared. It's not a commodity to hoard.

Furthermore, ANYONE can figure out how to wrap beads. Most bead magazines have instructions. Plus it's easy enough to find by googling.

So in as a response to her letter, I am re-posting my tutorial, below.

Good luck to all my fellow beaders and jewelry makers, and I hope your briolettes turn out BRILLIANTLY!


The Contrariwise Method to wrap briolettes and tear-shaped beads

Silver wire. (22, 24, or 26 gauge, depending on the desired effect, size of stone, and size of holes in the stone ) I don't cut my wire at a particular length; I use the entire roll and cut it at the end.

Bead / gemstone (briolette, teardrop, or marquise shape)

Round Nose Pliers

Cutting Pliers

Fingers

Instructions:

1)Thread the wire through the bead's hole, making it poke out about an inch on one side.

2)Pinch both wires at the top of the briolette to form the shape of a triangle, making sure that the stone is centered

3) Take the short end and wrap it around the longer wire 2-3 times, like this:

4)Snip off the tiny bit of wire sticking out.

5)Using your round pliers, create a loop:

(You could actuall stop here, finish with a wrapped loop, and be done. But we'll continue with wrapping the wire down the gemstone.)

6)Now start wrapping the wire. You will wrap around the wire below the loop, then wrap around the bead. You can stop wrapping above the hole in the bead or below it, depending on the look you want. In this case I wrapped below the hole.

7) At this point you need to decide how to finish this off. There are a number of ways:

• Cut the wire flush and either tuck it under the last wrap or press it neatly against the stone.


• Wrap the wire back up the bead carefully, then secure it by tucking it into the bead hole or wrapping it a couple of times under the loop. (If you want a "messy" look, wrap the wire back up loosely.)


• To create a swirl in front of the bead, cut the wire, leaving about 1/2 inch. Then create the swirl and press it against the bead. Example:


• Wrap the wire back up once accross the front of the wrapping, then a couple of times below the loop. (My preferred method). Example:

And that's all there is to it! Happy wire wrapping!

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Part 1 of this story can be found here.

As you read in my last post, I wanted to learn to make domed discs and incorporate them in my jewelry designs.

Starting with copper, which is obviously WAY LESS expensive than sterling, I learned by trial and error to make discs. The sheets of copper fit easily in the slit on the side of the disc cutter. (See right.) I found that one sharp blow with a heavy hammer was best - it resulted in the discs having sharp distinct edges. Only minor filing was required to make the edges smooth and ready for the next step, doming the discs to create softly concaved shapes.

To make concave discs, I started with the largest depression in the dapping block and used the largest punch. ( If I didn't start with the largest depression, I ended up with folds in the disc. An interesting look, but not one that I wanted. Trial and error - AGAIN!)

Then I progressively moved to smaller depressions until I got the shape I wanted.


After getting comfortable with the copper, I made a few discs in silver and domed them with the dapping block.

In the photo on the right, you can see three different discs.

On the upper right is a small non textured disc. The lower 2 discs have been texturized. They've been hammered with punches to get a texture that I liked. The one in the middle has also been oxidized and polished to bring out highlights.

I liked the earthy feel of the oxidized and textured discs. I could easily make them into jewelry, but I felt that they needed something else. I went through my boxes and boxes of beads and findings. I tried combining all kinds of beads with the sterling discs but finally settled on some coin pearls which I felt could stand up to the heft and the texture of the silver, and contrast it nicely.

On the left you see the final result. Sterling silver domed discs and coin pearls. I call them my Moonlit earrings.

(Modesty aside, isn't the photo great! Seriously, this is one of my favorites. Other than cropping it, nothing else has been done to enhance this photo.)

I really like the textures of the sterling against the iridescence of the pearls. I even made a pair of these earrings for myself- but I sold them off my ears from someone at work - and made a custom matching pendant.


Unfortunately, this is all I've been able to accomplish with my new tools recently. My full time job has been keeping me so busy that this jewlery sideline of mine - the artistic part of me at this point in my life- has languished. New designs have been really sparse. It's all I've been able to do to keep up with my Etsy Shop.

I've got lots of ideas drafted on paper. I only hope I can get them visualized.



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Lots of people ask how to oxidize or antique sterling silver. Many people use Liver of Sulfur or SilverBalck. One method that is "green" is using eggs. The sulfer in the egg yolks creates a chemical reaction with the silver and causes it to darken.

There are a lot of variations of this method. Here's mine:

1. Boil some eggs. The more jewelry, the more eggs you need.

2.Put hot unpeeled eggs in a heavy duty ziploc bag and zip shut. (The eggs have to be hot for this to work.)


3. Squish the eggs really well. The yolk of the egg is where all the sulfury goodness is, so you'll want the yolk well squished. (It's also really cathartic.)


This can be really messy and disgusting. So you should try to do this without children around because they'll want to have all the fun.

4. Place your jewelry in the bag with the egg.

If you don't want the mess, you can put a paper towel on top of the egg and lay the jewelry on top of the paper towel. Then leave your jewelry in the bag overnight.

I find that if I put the jewelry directly in the eggs, it's a lot quicker. The jewelry will be oxidized within about an hour.

Here you see that the jewelry is getting darker:

Unlike the other methods, you can achieve a golden brown color using eggs. I prefer it darker, so I'm leaving the jewelry in the egg for longer. Maybe another 20 minutes or so. Maybe longer.

If you want your silver darker and the egg has cooled, you can reheat the egg in a microwave for a few seconds. But becareful not to leave it in too long - the silver will heat up and melt the baggie!

After reheating, wait some more.


5. Do some handstands while you're waiting.

6 When your jewelry has oxidized as dark as you want it, remove it from the bag.

(At this point, it's probably a good idea to clean it before sending the jewelry to your buyer or photographing it for sale. )


7. Scrub the jewelry well with a little soap.


You can either leave it as is, or you can rub it with steel wool to highlight the textures.

Here's the same ring, before and after oxidizing:

Some variations on this method:

• Use a tupperware container or a glass jar instead of a ziplock.
• Hang a string or wire across the top of the tupperware so you can suspend your jewelry and not get egg all over it. Or make a little stand for your jewelry to sit on.
• Peel a warm egg and place it whole with your jewelry in a airtight container. Leave overnight or longer. (Supposedly works better with old eggs.)

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When you are just starting out with a business and money is tight, sometimes you have to make do with what you have. Even though a lot of inexpensive printing options are available, maybe you can't afford to get pretty business cards printed yet. Or maybe you haven't met many people, so you only need a few cards for right now.

If you have Microsoft Office, you can easily create your own custom business cards. (Although the steps may not be obvious.) Printing your own business cards can be an pretty affordable - of course you have to figure in the costs of the cardstock or labels, and the cost of color cartridges.

This is how I created my business cards. (It may seem like a lot of instructions, but it's really not hard at all.)


1. Open a blank document in Word. On the Tools menu, point to Letters and Mailings, and then click Envelopes and Labels.




2. You'll see a dialog box, like the one below, open. Click on the labels tab and then on the options button




3. Next the Label Options dialog box will open. Make sure the drop-down says Avery Standard and then scroll the Product Number down to 5371. Click OK.







4. Back in the Envelopes and Labels dialog box, make sure under Print, it says full page of the Same Label. Then click New Document.

A table appears with a bunch of 2 inch x 3.5 inch cells:




5. Now you can start setting up your first business card.


To add your logo or a picture, choose InsertPictureFrom File. Find your logo file on your hard drive and insert it.

(BTW, I created the "C" using PowerPoint.)


6. Add your contact information on the card. If you want to add a tab to move some text over within the table cell, press Ctrl+Tab. (Just pressing tab by itself moves you to the next cell.)





7. Once you have one card set up the way you like it, click and drag to highlight it. Press Ctrl+C to copy it. Then move to the next cell and press Ctrl+V to paste it in.



8. If you have the perforated Avery stock, all you have to do is run it through your printer and tear them apart. If you don't have the prefab stuff, or you don't want to use it, you can still do cards on plain old (cheapie) card stock and cut them yourself.

If you want to print them on card stock (like I did), it's a lot easier to cut them out if you put a very light border on the table.



Choose TableSelect Table:


And then choose FormatBorders and Shading:


In the Borders tab, click Grid. In the color drop-down choose Gray-25%:


In the Width drop-down change it to 1/4 point:


After you print it out, get out your X-acto knife or scissors or use a paper cutter and start cutting on the lines.

There you have it! Quick and easy business cards right from Microsoft Word.

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Silver wire. (22, 24, or 26 gauge, depending on the desired effect, size of stone, and size of holes in the stone ) I don't cut my wire at a particular length; I use the entire roll and cut it at the end.

Bead / gemstone (briolette, teardrop, or marquise shape)

Round Nose Pliers

Cutting Pliers

Fingers

Instructions:
1)Thread the wire through the bead's hole, making it poke out about an inch on one side.

2)Pinch both wires at the top of the briolette to form the shape of a triangle, making sure that the stone is centered

3) Take the short end and wrap it around the longer wire 2-3 times, like this:

4)Snip off the tiny bit of wire sticking out.

5)Using your round pliers, create a loop:

(You could actuall stop here, finish with a wrapped loop, and be done. But we'll continue with wrapping the wire down the gemstone.)

6)Now start wrapping the wire. You will wrap around the wire below the loop, then wrap around the bead. You can stop wrapping above the hole in the bead or below it, depending on the look you want. In this case I wrapped below the hole.

7) At this point you need to decide how to finish this off. There are a number of ways:

• Cut the wire flush and either tuck it under the last wrap or press it neatly against the stone. (Tucking it under can cause the wrapping to loosen and become "messy". )



• Wrap the wire back up the bead carefully, then secure it by tucking it into the bead hole. Below is an example of what it would look like. (This gorgeous wirewrapping was done by Raes Creations, who had the earrings for sale in her Etsy shop. Her blog is here. )

• To create a purposely "messy" look, wrap the wire back up the bead loosely. Then secure below the loop as explained above. Example that I found on Etsy:



• To create a swirl in front of the bead, cut the wire, leaving about 1/2 inch. Then create the swirl and press it against the bead. Example:


• Wrap the wire back up once accross the front of the wrapping, then a couple of times below the loop. (My preferred method). Example:

And that's all there is to it! Happy wire wrapping!

Update on 3/18/08: The above can now be found at my online shop.

If you'd be interesting in subscribing to my blog and receiving it by e-mail, just click Subscribe to Contrariwise ramblings by Email.

Contrariwise Jewelry is now a proud member of Metalsmiths in Action: http://metalsmithsinaction.webs.com/index.htm