On this beautiful Spring day we are going to talk about settings and I am going to show you beautiful jewellery made by the goldsmiths at Jewel Envy highlighting different settings.

There are many types of settings. There is claw setting (where the stone is held in place by prongs/ claws) and sometimes look like eagles claws. There is flush setting where a hole is drilled into the metal for the stone and then set. There is bezel setting where the metal surrounds the stone on all sides in most cases. There is tube setting where tubing is used in metal like sterling and karat gold and its for the stone to sit inside the tube.

The first one we will be looking at are earrings made by Alexis. They are pink tourmalines. And a pendant made by Gillian in 14k yellow gold with a yellow sapphire surrounded by flush set champagne diamonds then a marquise cut orange diamond below. They are both claw settings!

Next we have tube set diamonds in 14k yellow and white gold in ring by Eunice

Then we have a bezel set rutilated quartz in sterling silver by Jen.

Last but not least we focus on flush setting. Ring by Jennifer that are flush set black spinels. Pendant by Hayat with a purple amethyst.

Recently finished teaching the 8 week Enamel Class. I am always delighted when someone brings their artistic flair to this class, check out some of the finished work – Alexis

What is soft solder repair?

Solder is the name given to any metal alloy with a lower melting temperature than the two metals being used to join together. This means that almost any metal can be used as a solder if it has a lower melting temperature than the two metals and can flow properly into the cavity between the two. A concrete example of this using precious metal soldering is using different karats of gold. 10K yellow gold and 14k yellow gold each has their own solder. But if a goldsmith was working on a 14k yellow gold piece and ran out of that solder they could use a piece of 10k yellow gold in place as it would melt at a lower temperature to the 14k gold and would flow into the cavity between the two pieces of 14k yellow gold. Gold works well as a solder because it flows well and becomes almost liquid when it melts. All precious metal solders work this way.

There is another class of solder called soft solder that is used when pieces cannot take a lot of heat and or precious metal soldering is not important. Soft solder does not become liquid when heated (poor flowing properties) in the same way as precious metal solder but it does melt and adhere to the surface of the metals. Because soft solder does not fill the small cavity between metals but is instead lumped on top, the bond is not as strong. There are times when a piece of jewellery cannot be fixed by precious metal soldering because the piece cannot take any heat. Soft solder may seem like the answer but the bond is not strong enough to make this a good solution. This type of solder can also have a corrosive effect and can eat away at the metal. Soft solder usually contains lead and tin as the main ingredients which also means they react to the skin, lending further reason not to use them in precious metal jewellery.

’20 Tips on maintaining our Jewellery’, Gillian E. Batcher, 2013

Hollow jewellery should be appreciated for the technical skill required to make it either by hand or machine. Hollow work means a piece can be lighter than expected. This lends itself to larger sculptural works that remain comfortable to wear.

The challenge with hollow designs is that they can be difficult to fix if dented. Pulling out a dent in a hollow piece requires attaching a rod to the area that is dented, usually by soldering, heating the area and trying to pull the rod holding the dent outwards. The rod is then removed, and the piece can be refinished.

If the piece is sealed, the goldsmith will need to make a hole somewhere before heating to let the air escape. This process is difficult to trouble shoot; be sure to consult a goldsmith with extensive repair experience before attempting to restore a piece like this.

’20 Tips on maintaining our Jewellery’, Gillian E. Batcher, 2013

Old work, edited long ago and now posted – Alexis