Monday 18 May 2015

Sneak peeks from the studio....

...plus the one-off items up for grabs!

For those of you who follow Graceful Deviant on Facebook, you may have seen the new stones I've been playing with in the studio last week.
Laguna Agate Cabochon
The gorgeous red stone is Laguna Agate and I wasn't sure if it should become a necklace or a ring so I asked my fans on Facebook. One lucky follower let me know that if I could make a ring in her size then consider it sold! So I did! It's that simple folks - if you see anything in the first stages of a design please feel free to shout out your preferences and customise your own piece of jewellery!
So the finished ring is now on its way to the new owner:

I love the fact that this stone is cut and polished by hand from rough slab here in the U.K. I've met the Yorkshire lad several times before at gem shows and he carefully chooses rare, unusual stones that are untreated and ethically sourced. Laguna agate is a particularly rare form as it can only be found in an area 4 square kilometres in size on the side of mountain in Chihuahua, Mexico. How cool is that?!
I also finished setting this fossilised wood cabochon in silver too:
Fossilised wood set into sterling silver
I cut the tree detail out of the back plate using a tiny saw before soldering the bezel wall in place - not just for decoration but also as the wood cabochon has a tiny see-through inclusion right in the middle which I still wanted people to be able to admire!
Following on from the tree theme I also completed a commission to send off to America for a teachers retirement gift - a larger version of my Mighty Oaks necklace:
A couple of other custom orders that came in:
These next couple of weeks will see me working with some more stones so they will be complete one-offs. If you'd like to see what I'm working on next and have your say in what pieces should become hop on over to Facebook and join in the fun! There will also be lots of small run, limited edition items coming up too as I get to work with some gemstones and charms that I've been hoarding :)
My next event will be with The Blue Starfish jewellery on Saturday 30th May at Devizes followed by Graceful Deviant on Sunday 31st May in Bradford on Avon.
Hope to see some locals there! Bye for now!