Jewellery out of anything?

I have had a long weekend away and although I took some silver wire and had some tools with me decided that at least one of my rings would have to be made quickly from something I 'found'.  I had picked this bit of cellophane up at MIMA in Middlesbrough on Thursday evening when I went to a really inspiring talk by the jeweller Ted Noten.  It was still in my bag so became Saturday's ring of the day.  I like to occasionally play around with odd materials and even though it is just a bit of wrapping tied in a not it has a kind of flamboyance and definitely the sparkle we expect in jewellery.  Just a bit of fun really

More rings

Three rings in three consecutive days.  I began with the opals that have been lying in a box in my workbench for a few years.  I bought the opal in matrix at a trade fair about 5 years ago and decided to pair it with a small opal triplet which was in the same box.  Then I realised I had become interested in the bezel settings again.  I used to make bezel settings all the time but haven't done this for a while either.  The teardrop textured piece of the second ring is made in art clay silver and was in a box of bits on my bench.  I made it when I was showing a student how to make a mould.  It was from a plastic button.  The round bezel is then filled with resin and gold leaf.  The third ring I have used another bit of art clay silver that was lying in my bits box and made this double bezel.  In the shallow one I have used tinted resin and in the larger deeper bezel I have used clear resin and tiny chopped up bits of red thread.  I am really enjoying making bezels so will have to do some more soon.

Today's ring

I was planning to go into the museum today but put it off as the weather forecast was so bad - actually turned out not to be as bad as expected, anyway, I did spend the day in the studio working on a few ideas.  Here is my Ring a day contribution for today.  This is made using a scrap of silver left in the bottom of my workbench after I had cut out the shapes making the 'Necklace for the Plant Collector's wife'.  It is made using a technique called fold forming.  This is something I was introduced to by Jill Leventon when I spent a fantastic day in her studio in Shrewsbury early  last year.  Jill will be one of the tutors at the Guild of Enamellers annual conference at Nottingham in April running a workshop on press and fold forming.

Ring a day, day 5

Well, in theory this is a ring each day for a year!  Here is today's offering and as you can see some days I have very little time to spare and have to really think fast, make fast from anything on hand.  I was just finishing off in the studio and suddenly remembered I hadn't done a ring today...... grabbed a bit of card that was lying on the bench and here it is.  I actually really like it - so think the challenge is doing a good job

Ring a day, day 3/09012010

Today I was simply going to make the paper version of this ring and it happened by accident as I was checking that a circle paper punch worked and just picked up an old scrap of paper, originally a discarded template for something.  With a bit of folding and curling of the paper I realised that I really liked the shape and form so found a bit of re-cycled plastic and made another version from that.

Ring a day, day 2

Today's ring is this felt flower.  I have had some bits of wool in a drawer for ages, given to me by a friend after a workshop.  I made this in two stages.  Firstly I wet felted the whole thing then, as I wasn't quite happy with the result, I needle felted at the junction between the main part of the flower and the loop of the ring to strengthen it.  I then had another go at wet felting it.  I am quite happy with the result and it was a bit of fun this morning before I began my more usual work in art clay silver.