Unique Stones and Jewelry

It’s been quite a while since I contributed to a magazine so I was glad The Finnish Gem Hobbyists’ Society magazine in December published an article I co-wrote about silver clay and stones. I showed different possibilities to use ready-made and hand-made stone settings, but the focus was on creating a unique silver frame from silver clay to highlight the beauty of natural stone cabochons.

Over time, I have quite a collection of stone cabochons and whenever traveling, I try to do some local stones hunting. In most case these stones really are not expensive, but definitely have unique patterns and colors which I love. It’s amazing how a tiny surface could show so much detail.

Dark grey petrified wood cabochon and silver pendant

One of the jewelry featured in the article was a silver pendant I made recently, using a dark grey petrified wood cabochon and silver clay syringe. This cabochon has a unique look: the beige spots almost look like ‘painted’ or ‘printed’ on the grey surface. I used three prongs to set it, quite similar to my piece ‘Coral’. The difference, this time I made the prong from pieces of silver wire instead of silver clay. The silver frame itself I created in simple wire-wrap style, which after so many sketches proved to be the best in complementing the graphic look of the stone. Using the wire prongs is great as I can show more of the sides and edges of the cabochon, instead of covering it with bezel wire.

Coral fossil cabochon and silver pendant

I made another piece with the same setting technique, this time using a coral fossil cabochon with ornamental frame. The shapes of the decoration came from the shape of the flower-like pattern. I documented the project into a downloadable tutorial in Finnish language, which is available for purchase from Hopeasavi.fi. Until mid-January 2016 this tutorial is a charity item and part of the sale results will go for giving ‘the gift of time’ for lonesome seniors and youngsters.

The New Year is near so I put together a little collage of some jewelry I created in 2015 for contest, magazine article and how-to posts.

Some jewelry I made in 2015

I created these jewelry in 2015 for how-to posts of Hopeasavi.fi newsletter.

I’ve made several pieces with stones this year. One of my favorite would be the ‘Winter Garden’ locket which has a moonstone cabochon on its front as you can see on the picture here. I used moonstone for the first time and it really did its job to capture the feeling of ‘ice’, ‘freezing’ and ‘magical’, all I needed for a winter-scene jewelry!

What about you, do you have a favorite stone, especially in a piece of jewelry? Share your story on the comment below if you do.

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