New Techniques

As a designer, I am always exploring new techniques for creating my jewelry. Mind you, they are not new to the world, just new to me. Creating art is progressive, and jewerly is art. Women become canvases. When we add makeup, to look better, we are basically painting our face. We get dressed, and then add jewelry to add a little bling to our look. Sometimes we want casual jewelry, and sometimes we want to go for "wow".  So jewelry is art, and artists evolve. I have wanted to add gold to my creations, but we all know that gold is very expensive. This is where an old Koren technique, called Keum-Boo is used fusing 24K gold foil to sterling silver with heat, is something I've starting doing. You will see that I have starting using diamonds to some choice pieces too. Nothing like diamonds to really add some bling.

Here is a pair of sterling silver earrings, with Australian boulder opals, diamonds and Keum-Boo 24K gold.

Time Flies

Time does fly by and here we are at the end of the 2014 year. I have been reminding myself that I need to get back to updating this blog here. I've neglected it for quite a while. Blogging does not come easy for me. I'm a designer, not a writer. Since I last posted, we sold our house and thus, I don't have my workshop anymore. We are in a temporary space, until we decide to put down roots in another state. So for a while, I was not able to create my jewelry pieces. My husband set up for me a temporary workshop, so I am very happy working on some creations again. I will be putting up some photos of my recent works here. They are available for purchase on my website or my Etsy shop.

Where are my posts?

You may have noticed that I haven't been posting here lately. It's because we have been busy branching out our jewelry business be creating cabochon gemstones for LaJeanne Design and other jewelry designers. In the past, I have spent a lot of time hunting the internet for interesting pieces of semi-precious gemstones like turquoise, agate, jaspers and opals, to use in creating my jewelry. I wanted to be able to design some of my own stones. So my husband and I decided to start a companion business to the jewelry making. It's always fun to try something new, so I've put my jewelry creations on hold for a while to get the cabochon-making business get going. In the meantime, I have a lot of inventory listed for sale and I will still be creating designer jewelry in the near future. For now I am concentrating on our business at http://www.drycreekcabs.com.

What's on the drawing board

Well, I haven't been to current with this blog lately. It always gets left behind. What I like to spend my time most on is designing jewelry (of course). There is also keeping my website store up-to-date along with the Etsy shop. This all takes time, so my blog here is my little bastard child and gets neglected.

But today I though I would add a few pictures from the projects I'm doing the last couple of weeks. Here are some sketches.

This is usually how I work. I take some of my stones and trace
them on a sketch pad. The I work a design  around them

Here are the sketches with the stone placed over the drawing..

 Below are a couple of the finished pieces.

Leopardskin Jasper with yellow Citrine.

Large stone is an Ocean Jasper with druzy, and an oval Opal on top.

3rd Annual Acton/Agua Dulce Art Tour

The weekend of October 8-9, 2011, I was proud to be part of the local Art Council's third annual art tour. This was made up of local artisans in different medias. This included painters, sculptors, wood turners, metal sculptors, designers in textiles, and jewelry. It was located at twelve locations over the area. Some locations were businesses that made space available for the artists, and some locations were the studios at the artist's own residences.

I brought my designs in jewelry and also some of my oil paintings for show. The weather was great and it was fun to talk to the people that stopped by, that were taking this free art tour.  It would have been nice to be able to leave and go browse the other artists, but that wasn't feasible. I look forward to next year's Art Tour.

Rings

Lately, I have been working on rings. I held back working on them for a while now, but I have had several requests for them. I'm really having a ball working on them. The problem is trying to figure out what size I want to make for each ring. I am doing various sizes so that it will fit  various sized fingers. Several are larger sizes, so as to fit the "mature" finger, but they will also work for smaller fingers it the ring is put on one of the larger fingers instead of the typical "ring" finger. These rings are on my website.

How It Begins. . . .

I thought I would put up here, just a bit, on how my pieces get started.


I actually don't spend too much time thinking about it. It starts when I get my stone and put it on a pieces of paper in front of me. Sometimes, the paper is just a little yellow post-it. But usually it's in my spiral sketch pad. I start by tracing the stone on the paper, then do several configurations around it till I get one I like. It's not rocket science for me. Maybe, I should plan a little bit more, but I get an idea I am happy with and go from there. Here are some photos of two of my recent sketches, and then the final piece of jewelry.

Busy, busy. . . keywords

Haven't posted here much lately. Been busy getting a few of my items up on the Etsy shop. If it was up to me, I would just have my shop at my own website, but the Etsy shop helps get exposure. Also, I got going with the Google Adwords, Google Analytics, Google Conversion, Facebook and Facebook Ads. Good luck to me to try and figure that all out. To be successful, marketing is a must, and Google is the king of all searches. I am definitely a right-side of the brain person, but all this analytics stuff is for left-side brained people. I created my own website, but I think that's the creative part of me that designs it, not the technical part. So that's okay. So that's where I have been lately. Looking at charts, graphs and determining keywords.


I have been making a few jewelry pieces too, so when I get a bit of time, I will put those photos up on the blog.

Etsy Shop Now Open

To get more coverage on the internet, this week I opened an Etsy shop for a few of my jewelry pieces. Most of my jewelry is for sale on my own website at http://www.lajeannedesign.com/, but for those of you that are familiar with the Etsy stores, you can check it out there.


http://www.etsy.com/shop/lajeannedesign

Sterling Silver Earrings

I love making pendants with interesting rocks so much, sometimes I get away from making earrings. Yet, if most women are like me, they always put a pair of earrings on when they leave the house, but not necessarily a necklace. Anyway, that's me. If I don't have earrings on, it's like I left home without shoes on. So I think I need to spend a little more time making that part of jewelry ware. So here is a photo of a pair I made recently. I love these. These can be worn almost anywhere. A pair of jeans or getting dressed up.

Sterling silver earrings with ear posts.

New Jewelry with my New Gems

As I stated earlier, I went to the huge (and I mean huge) gem show in Tucson this month. I brought home several stones that I was anxious to get working with. So here are the first pieces with my new gems.

Beautiful Boulder Opal 	Finished Boulder Opal from the stone on the left.  
Boulder Opal	Finished Boulder Opal necklace.
Koroit Opal	Koroit Opal necklace
 Pear-shaped Larimar 	  Larimar necklace from the stone on the left. 
Another Larimar necklace 	Necklace made of Ammonite (a fossil)
Sonoran Sunsent pendant	Sonoran Sunset stone in pendant
Rectangle Palmwood & Black Onyx.

Tucson Gem Show

This last week, I have been at the huge, International Gem Show, in Tucson, Arizona. This was my first time there. Wow, gems and rocks and jewelry, in so many places.

They said is was in approximately 48 places around Tucson. I went to most of them. I went there to purchase some nice stones for jewelry making, and that I did. So I am looking forward to getting to work and designing some lovely pieces with my purchases. Here are a couple of photos of some of the flat stones I got for making earrings and necklaces. I particularly like the Turquoise and Boulder Opals, so I purchased several of them.

Nice rocks!

Here some fine gemstone necklaces I've completed during the last few months. I really like to use pretty pieces of "rock" to make some interesting and unique necklaces. I will be doing more of this kind of work. I am planning to go to the International Gem Show in Tucson the end of January, and I hope to pick up some interesting stones to work with.

New Lander Turquoise

Black Fossil Coral

Blue Biggs Jasper



Shopping cart now open

You are now able to buy online on my website. www.lajeannedesign.com. Shop using PayPal.

My Pieces Are Getting Larger.

Well, it seems that way. It's just because the current projects have large gemstone cabochons. For those that don't know, cabochons are stones that the gemologist grinds, polishes and shapes it with a "flat" back so that it may be put in a metal backplate. So lately, I've been scouring the web for designer cabochons to make necklaces with. I've bought several, that my pocketbook can afford, and here are two that I designed this week.

This is a Leopard Jasper stone set in "blackened"

sterling silver base, attached to a string of Picture Jasper chips.

This one is a Montana Moss Agate also set in a "blackened"

sterling silver base, attached to a chain of

Bracciated Jasper, Picture Jasper and silver beads.

The agate is see-through, if you hold it up to the light, so

here, the shiny back of the sterling silver shows through the agate.

Flowers Anyone?

I'm not much of a flower person, but I did one on a hammered sterling silver disc this week. It turned out rather well. It's the kind of flower I would wear. It's a flower that makes a statement.

Tuxedo Agate Pendant

Completed today, the Sterling Silver and Tuxedo Agate necklace. Here's the stone.

It turned out just like my sketch, done on scrap piece of paper, and just how I wanted it. I would say I tend to make what I would want to wear. Maybe, not everyone's taste, but I like the hammered and "banged up" look to jewelry. I'm not a big fan the the perfect ,fine jewelry you might find in a jeweler's store at the mall. I like something more artistic, and I think I have accomplished that in this piece.  Hope you like it.

A Good Day With Argentium Silver

Well, I had a good production day this week. I managed to solder several pieces without melting the whole thing. Soldering is a tricky bit. I'm still trying to get the hang of it. Too cold and the solder won't flow. Too hot. . . and you know what happens. Like ice cubes on the hot sidewalk. So I did complete three necklaces with my Argentium Sterling Silver. You can check my Necklaces - Metal section for that. I'm happy with them. They look great. Yesterday was not so good of a day. Worked all day on one piece, and am not happy with it. It may go in the trash. So much work, and a loss. Well, that happens when I get "creative" and try something new. I was making a bezel setting for Montana Moss Agate,

Montana Moss Agate

and my backplate was too thin. I managed to burn several holes in over the day. I hope to finally get this setting made, the stone is lovely.

I mentioned above, Argentium Silver. I use that exclusively. You may or may not have heard of it. It's a new silver, since 1996, invented in England. It's being called the silver of the 21st century.What is does, is not tarnish as much as regular sterling silver. And who likes tarnish to clean? Not me. All sterling silver has 7.5% alloy in it for strength. Usually, that has some copper. So with Argentium silver, they left out the copper (with attributes to tarnishing) and replaced it with an alloy call Germanium. One characteristic of Argentium Silver is that it melts at a lower temperature than regular silver. Thus, my over-heating problem. But I will get the hang of it in time.

So included here are some pictures of this weeks new creations.



Note: I am publicly sharing my frustration with this Blogger. I cannot place items where I want them, and spaces are added every time I log in and view it.  I will be happy when I get my "official" website up and www.lajeannedesign.com, but I don't have time to create it right now. I will post it when it is up. Thanks.

I Love New Tools

Tools of the trade are important. It's amazing how you can do a much better job with the right tool. Last week my husband bought me a new torch for soldering the jewelry pieces. I mentioned that I would like a smaller torch tip, thus giving a smaller flame. What I had been using was the tip he had for doing some heavy duty welding. I would periodically drop a line that I am working on small pieces, not a trailer hitch. So last week, when he went to fill my oxygen/acetylene bottles, he came home with new torch tips. Great! Now I won't melt my precious silver and destroy my hard work, not to mention the cost of ruined silver. So below is one piece I did yesterday with my new set of tips.

Hammered copper cuff with sterling silver applique.

Finished the Piece

Sometimes my form-folded copper pendants stack up and I don't complete the piece. So today I finally finished a pendant that's been sitting on my work desk for a while. This is the finished piece.

And this one. Part of my "Matchstick" collection.