Instantly Aged Chinese Coin

A friend of mine recently visited China and humored my request that she bring back some coins for me. When I am fortunate enough to get my hands on worldly coins, I will sometimes incorporate them into jewelry pieces. Some of the Chinese coins that I found waiting for me at my front door yesterday morning (I love surprises like that!) were new and shiny and so not capturing my interest. I decided to try some instant aging and fired up the torch. I started out with a coin like the one on the left. I slowly brought the coin to a bright red glow and let it cool a bit before quenching it in water. I drilled 2 connector holes, removed burs, and domed it slightly in my daping block. I then used a foam sanding block to bring out some of the details and to get a matte finish. Ahhhhhhhhhhhh........so much better on the right!

Rolling Mill

I love tools! That's one of the reasons why I enjoy making jewelry- I can absolutely justify spending time browsing through my catalogs and spending money on new tools that will let me do really cool things. I recently bought this rolling mill when I found it at a local store at a price that did not make me faint. I had been coveting a mill listed in one of my catalogs, but between the listed price and the considerable shipping cost, I could not bring myself to get beyond the coveting stage. While this is not my DREAM rolling mill, it is doing a fine job for me. I drilled two holes through my work table, did some minimal assemblage and I was ready to roll.


I went to a yard sale last month and found a bin of fabric and trim scraps. There was a piece of lace that had a lovely pattern, and I bought it for 25 cents. The woman told me that the lace had been passed on to her from her mother and she was very fond of it (although being a 25 cent yard sale item suggests she wasn't TOO fond of it). I didn't have the heart to tell her what I was going to do with it since I knew it was destined for the mill. I sandwiched part of the lace between two equal sized pieces of brass and then cranked the 'sandwich' through the mill. The pressure of the two steel rollers compresses the three layers, leaving an imprint of the lace on both pieces of brass. The pressure also destroys the lace. Sorry, yard sale lady.

Years ago, I found an ugly old lamp that surprisingly had a base made out of sterling silver. I dismantled the lamp and cut the base into segments which were then flattened with a plastic mallet. The lower piece in the above photo is how the base looked after the flattening. Using a different type of lace, I ran a couple of the base pieces through the mill and now have a beautiful, imprinted floral pattern.

I had received a card decorated with a dimensional flower and thought it might make a good impression. I placed it between two pieces of brass and got an interesting ghost-like image of the flower. I hammered the brass pieces flat, annealed the metal and cut out discs.

The discs were drilled to create links and then domed in my dapping block. I lightly sanded the surface to get a soft, lustrous matte finish. Some of the discs were used to make the above bracelet. My tools are great!

Salvaged Typewriter

I had been wanting to find an old typewriter for some time when I came across this relic at a local church sale. I wanted to try to use typewriter keys in some of my jewelry pieces but only if I could locate a cheap source. At $5.00, I decided this was my chance.

Oh my goodness..........taking apart this typewriter was a more challenging task than I had imagined it would be. So many screws to locate and loosen! After being tightly wound for probably 60 plus years, some of the screws absolutely refused to cooperate. As I struggled to get to the point where the 'keyboard' keys could be removed, I developed such an appreciation for the beauty and complexity of the design and for the amount of workmanship that was required to ensure that I would never figure out how to take this machine apart. It was at around this point of the dissection when my attention shifted from the 'keyboard' to the striker keys. I thought they would be interesting stamps for imprinting text onto some of my metal jewelry.
The battle continued until I finally was able to lift out the connected set of striker keys which have a lovely, older font style.

My salvaged typewriter striker/stamps are now organized and ready for use. Many of the other typewriter pieces are stored for a future necklace that I am picturing in my mind and has already been tentatively named

'You're Just My Type'.

Thrift Store Lamp Jewels

I found these lamps at my local thrift store. They are not quite my style, so I did not want them for my living room. I did find myself wondering what the living room where they presumably were prior to the thrift store might have looked like.

I wanted these lamps for all the emerald green cut glass dangles. For the 'firm' price of $5.00, I could get a reasonable number of future jewelry components.

I dismantled the lamps and have this lovely pool of green pendants and links. The brass portions of the lamps have been put away for some future, undetermined project.

This pendant has been wrapped with brass wire and can now be worked into a necklace. Maybe that will be one of this weekend's projects.

Recycled Copper Wire

Because of my landscape design business, I know a variety of contractors who are wonderfully talented in their particular areas of expertise. They are also sometimes wonderful suppliers of leftovers from their projects. This tornado of copper wire was the leftover from a large spool on a construction site. It would have been taken to the construction material recycling facility, but it was my lucky day- the contractor gave this bundle to me. I think that it amuses some people that I look at construction site debris and see jewelry making supplies. I knew that I would be able to do lots of things with this wire!




I cut varying lengths of the wire and then soldered them into rings. This photo shows a selection of soldered rings after taking them out of the pickling solution. They are still fairly messy looking since I have not yet filed off the excess solder. I use a metal file to do the initial cleaning and then finish with an abrasive attachment on my flex-shaft.

After cleaning off the solder, I usually hammer the rings flat which leaves a surface texture that I find appealing. I sometimes add more texture by hammering an old chisel into the surface as shown in the top left ring. There are two small dimples on this top left ring made with a center punch. These are the points where I will drill to turn the ring into a link.




Here are some ways that I have used the recycled copper wire. The largest rings were sized to be bangles. I joined two of the bangles with a smaller soldered ring that holds a wire wrapped lampwork bead. The open ring on the pin to the right is similar to the ring in the above photo. Here, I riveted the ring to a textured brass base. At the bottom is a link that I will use in a future piece. With this, I sandwiched a disc that I cut from a tin that was covered with vintage images. I drilled 4 holes into the copper ring and lower base- 2 for riveting and 2 for future linking.

Lamp Base Earrings

While there is a fair amount of variety to the type of jewelry that I make, I have the most fun when making pieces that incorporate recycled and/or found objects. My family is committed to recycling and I find it very satisfying when my jewelry reflects that commitment. I search the local thrift stores and flea markets for interesting metal and old costume jewelry that I can take apart, cut up or otherwise manipulate to create something new. I like to think of it as continuing a storyline that someone else began.

I found the above piece at a thrift store. This was the lone survivor part of an old lamp, and I was drawn to it because of the lovely pattern on the sides. The base was so filthy that I couldn't identify what type of metal it was, but I was hopeful that cleaning would reveal something that I could use.

Some light sanding of the surface brought out the detailing of the patterning and the color of the metal suggested that it was possibly nickle.

I began to cut apart the base and decided that I wanted some small bits that could be used for earrings. The small bit at the bottom of the photo has been filed and sanded.

My metal shears and my determination let me cut out sections of the base.

Some of my lamp base small bits were soldered onto brass that I had previoulsy etched. This picture captures the problem that I sometimes have when soldering. At the point when the solder flows, part of my piece unfortunately flows as well and goes wacky out of kilter. ARGHH!

These lamp base bits were soldered onto pieces of copper that I had cut using my metal guillotine. The copper was filed, sanded, polished and then drilled for the connector jump rings. Swarovski crystals were wire wrapped with balled sterling wire.