Tag: commissioned piece

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Commission – Opal and Diamond Wedding Ring

Solitaire opal and gold ring, FrontSolitaire opal and gold ring, Side
Wedding rings can come in all shapes and sizes
A young couple came to me with this beautiful black opal to set as a wedding ring. I bezel set two small diamonds on the band of the ring to compliment the colors moving in the stone. The result is a thing of beauty!
Delicate beauty
Opals, in all their firey beauty, are surprisingly delicate. They measure from 5.5 to 6.5 on the Mohs Hardness Scale so they can be easily scratched by metal and glass. I advised them how fragile opals are, but the beauty outweighed the risk. As a preventative measure, she will be wearing a chain to hang it around her neck when doing heavy work.
Do you have any ideas for creating a special ring? Perhaps you’d like to reuse a family heirloom and combine it with new accents, or we could start from scratch and order pieces to put together in a unique way? Let’s get in touch!
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Commission – 14kt Yellow Gold Coin Wedding Ring Set

These commissioned pieces from April 2017, were for a new customer who came to me with a very touching story.
Samantha was about to buy a train pass with coins she was putting into a ticket machine. The change fumbled and one rolled out into the street. A gentlemen in the line behind her ran out and retrieved her coin. Later, while on the train, they developed a friendship because of the coin. In time their relationship blossomed, and they decided to have the coin made into a promise ring.
Later, the couple decided to get married and wanted to commission 14kt gold wedding rings. Their original promise ring was not made of precious metal, and it needed to be modified to balance the design.  I was able to make a cast of the impression of the gold coin from the promise ring and incorporate the impression into the new gold rings.
The first photo is the modified version of the gents ring with a brass rim added to its edge, just after it came out of the rubber mold. The second photo is the ladies ring, modified with the brass rim but polished. At that stage, the mold was made, and the wax models were cast in gold.
A beautiful unique set a memorable love story.

 

This is the man’s ring after being pulled straight from the mold after casting in gold, unpolished.

 

This is the base shape for woman’s ring before being cast.

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14kt White Gold Bypass Wedding Ring

This tricky commissioned piece was a compliment to an existing engagement ring. The challenge was to make a wedding ring that would match a bypass ring band, as opposed to a normal round band.

The first step was to make a wax model that wrapped around on opposite sides of the existing ring. My solution was to make a bar at the base to hold the two pieces together.  The ring was then cast, using the lost wax process, then pave set with small round diamonds. Challenge met!

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Stunning 14kt Yellow Gold Enamel and Amethyst Pendant

Magic happens when two artists collaborate! The rich colors and stunning textures of this pendant blow me away every time.

What a success! My gemstones and cuttlebone casting combined with my fellow artist Ligia’s purple iris enameled piece create a fabulous pendant.

In this commissioned piece, a talented friend of mine that I have worked with for many years came to me with an enameled purple iris of hers to set into a pendant. I designed a setting for her beautiful enameled piece that incorporated the organic forms from the cuttle bone casting technique. I feel this setting really highlights the natural beauty of the subject. I accented her enameled piece with a bezel set oval faceted amethyst at the top of the pendant.

I have worked previously with Ligia, a miniature artist, several times. Her talent for enameling, paired with my metal work has created some very stunning art pieces.

I have worked together with many other artists over my 40 years of experience, setting their creations to complete the design. Would you like to collaborate?

If you are also an artist and have ideas for working together, please send me a DM with a proposal.

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14kt Yellow Gold Diamond Ring Reborn

What once was lost, has now been… re-made!

Original mock up before converting the settings!

I made this commissioned piece in September 2016, when one of my wonderful customers came to me heartbroken! Her beautiful diamond ring slid off her finger, without her knowing it, when she removed her golfing glove! Years before I had worked on the original ring, so I knew just what was involved to remake it. I was able to modify a blank mounting of a bypass ring and add on two pear shaped heads for the two main 1 ct. diamonds to sit in. It came out spectacularly, and she wears it everyday. What a success!
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14kt White and Yellow Gold Diamond Anniversary Pendant

Anniversary Pendant

A portion of the track mechanism is visible just below the bail

Original sketch, diamond position later changed

This was one of my more challenging commissioned pieces from October 2016. One of my long time clients wanted a special pendant for his wife to celebrate their wedding anniversary. He wanted to use both of their initials (N and Z), and to have a diamond set within a 14kt pendant of both white and yellow gold. The mechanics were challenging to design, as he wanted the letters of their initials to be able to be interchangeable by rotating. I came up with a design that would allow that interchangability by creating a track on the back of the pendant, in which the bail is able to change positions, which in turn rotates the whole pendant, and gives the impression of the “Z” changing to an “N” and vise versa.