Making My Own Silver Rings
It's been a long time since I attended this workshop.
This workshop was by Analise Austin from Mind's Eye Collective. I had been eyeing their jewelry workshops for a while and finally had the time to attend one. It was a small group, and we each got to make our own ring — here's how it went.
We were first introduced to the tools, measured our finger sizes, and then practiced hammering on a practice piece.
We then selected a piece of silver, which the instructor cut according to our finger size. The silver came in different thicknesses and widths. We started hammering whatever texture we wanted onto the metal, after which we heated it to make it easier to bend.
Once we bent the silver to form a ring, we used soldering to seal the gap, dropped it in water, and then treated it in an acidic solution called pickling. This makes the silver shiny again after all that heating.
After that, we put it in this rotating machine with tiny balls, which makes it even shinier and hardens the surface.
It's been a while since I attended this workshop, so I don't know if I missed any details, but it was a nice workshop with a lovely instructor. Unfortunately, we only had time to make two pieces.
For the first piece, I wanted to make a simple one with texture, but the texture didn't come out properly — I was a bit timid with the hammering. In order to demonstrate it to us, the instructor ended up doing most of it for me.
For the second piece, I wanted my initials on it, and to give it some extra design, I added a few hearts and some texture.
It was a fun and rewarding experience.
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