Yesterday I redid the jewellery photographs that I’d taken the previous day and I’m much happier with the results. So I’ve started listing more new work in my handmade jewellery shop.

Much of this work I had previously started but not resolved – some over a year ago! So I made an effort to go back to the pieces lurking around my bench and finally got them completed and ready to put into production.

This ironwork pattern pendant is a smaller, redesigned version of the ironwork pendant I have been making for some time. It is based on an antique ironwork pattern and has been intricately cut out of sterling silver.

The pendant is 1.6cm (0.63″) tall and wide and is suspended on a blackened sterling silver chain with handmade findings.

These ixora flower pieces were inspired by the gorgeous bunches of ixora flowers in vibrant yellows and oranges that I saw in the lush tropical gardens of Bali.

The flowers are made in a metal called shibuchi. This is a Japanese alloy of 75% copper and 25% silver. Its colour varies from an golden-pink through to a light copper colour, depending much it has oxidised, meaning the colour of the pieces will vary over time as you wear them – and can of course be quickly cleaned of tarnish in silver dip to get back to the original colouring.

The ixora flowers pendant features five flowers suspended from a narrow oval of sterling silver so they hang in a cluster which changes depending on how the flowers fall. The pendant is on my favourite simple sterling silver chain with handmade findings.

The ixora flower earrings feature one flower per earring suspended from handmade sterling silver ear wires. They will swing as you move.

I’ve also added two new pairs of cufflinks to my jewellery for men range. The above damask cufflinks feature my favourite damask-style pattern. The pattern has been blackened and then the piece has been tumbled to polish the entire cufflinks, but also to give the pattern a gunmetal grey type finish.

The other pair I’ve added have a very 1960s looking circles pattern on them. Visit my jewellery for men section (also in my Australian shop) to see more.

There is more handmade jewellery already listed and more yet still to come. For now you can check out everything that’s new in my handmade jewelry shop (prices in US$, delivery everywhere) or my handmade jewellery shop (prices in AU$, delivery to Australia and NZ).

I’ll post about more new pieces soon.

I spent some time at my bench this weekend making some jewellery for one of my consignment outlets along with for my own stocks. And the results of my labour all needed to be tumbled in steel shot to become bright and shiny.

A batch of handmade jewellery fresh from my new tumbler.

Recently I purchased a sparkly new Lorotone tumbler to replace the wonderful but now old and slightly decrepit tumbler my Dad made for me years ago using bits from his shed).

It’s taking me a while to get used to the ways of my new tumbler. Because I’d used my old (and rather eccentric!) one for such a long time I knew exactly how much shot, water and tumbling compound it needed and exactly how long my work needed to be tumbled to get the result I wanted.

Of course my new tumbler is different and it will take me some experimenting to get those things right.

It’s been making me think about how very familiar we all become with the tools and equipment we use extensively. Changing those things can be a bit disorientating at times. But of course change can be a good thing!

Sometimes it feels a tad depressing to be working in a field where the cost of your materials is down to the sometimes extreme whims of a market which has absolutely nothing to do with what you make.

At the moment both silver and gold are priced higher than they have been for a very long time. However, especially since the global economic crisis kicked off the price of gold has been going crazy as investors have been sinking their money into it, seeing it as a much safer bet than the stock market.

But as someone buying gold as a material to make jewellery with and not as an investment (or to make investment jewellery with), this is definitely unhelpful!

The photograph above is of a piece of 14ct gold (that’s 14kt for Americans) which is 0.5mm thick (0.02″) and 35mm tall and wide (1.4″). It set me back AU$245 (currently around US$200). Ouch!

Silver has also been going up and up for the past couple of years for all sorts of complex reasons. It is currently costing around double what it has done for most of my career. But to give an idea of how much more expensive gold is by comparison, 14ct gold is currently around 28 times more expensive per gram than sterling silver at trade cost.

Gold is a wonderful material to work with, but it does indeed hurt when a very small business like mine needs to purchase it.

As for what I’ll be making with my teensy little piece of gold … well I have a few ideas, but nothing concrete at this point. I have been using thinner gold as highlights in a few handmade jewellery pieces for a while now, but I would like to make some pieces where gold is more of a feature.

Stay tuned for details!

Finally last weekend (which was a long one in Australia) I was able to get back to my jewellery bench, now set up in the studio space in my new home.

I spent the weekend completing an order for the National Portrait Gallery shop in Canberra, along with making some urgently needed jewellery for my own supplies seeing as I’ve been badly running out of the jewellery in my shops.

Above are just a few of the little silver blossoms I cut out in sterling silver on the weekend. Each of them were then soaked to remove the paper (with the shape drawn on it), sanded, filed, tumbled and then finally turned into finished jewellery which was then tumbled again.

I seem to spend half of my life making these little blossoms as they form some of the most popular jewellery pieces I sell, so it was no surprise to spend my first weekend of making since moving doing yet more of them!

As for how my new studio is working out, well so far so good! The space is almost fully set up, but there are a few loose ends to tidy up.

The only issue I found on the weekend was that the three large windows let in so much light (in spite of the room being painted so dark) that heating or soldering metal can be difficult because I can’t see what I’m doing! All I need to do is remember to pull a blind or two down before I start and it’s fine, however.

This is not going to be set up as my ‘dream studio’ seeing as I’m still renting and things like fume extraction, heavy equipment which should be bolted to the floor or heavy furniture, etc. are currently out of the question. But soon enough I hope to be working towards just that!

Ever wondered what half a kilogram of sterling silver looks like? Well, okay, you probably haven’t. But now you know the answer!

This is actually just under half a kilogram (479g to be exact – or 1.05 US pounds). Each of the sheets is 0.5mm thick and approximately 65mm tall and wide (that would be 0.02″ thick and 2.6″ tall and wide).

And of course each one of them will be used in making my handmade jewellery – in fact, some have been already!

I use a great deal of 0.5mm sterling silver sheet as it’s my favourite thickness to work with, so I’m always running out of the stuff. So this year I thought I would buy a chunk of it in the hope that this will see me through much of the busy festive season without me needing to dash back to my suppliers too frequently, while hoping that they have enough stock on hand whenever I need it.

Yes, I have spent a lot of time at my bench over the last few days! Not to mention slaving away over a pot of etching solution.

I thought I would share the result of this hard work with you as all of this jewellery looks like an impressive amount all bundled up together! And this isn’t all of it – some has already been sent on its way in some orders.

Not all of the pieces are finished in the photographs – some of them have now been blackened or given a silver oxide finish. And of course various pieces need to be completed by being made into necklaces, hung on ear wires, etc..