Brooches in Copper and Silver wire

Making jewellery is a fascinating past-time. Holding a piece of copper or stained glass in my hand and imagining what it can become is exciting and exhilarating, gets the creative juices flowing and can lead to hours of immersion in the design. There's a certain thrill in looking down at the new piece just made.

.10mm Silver plated wire from Germany I mostly use. Other sizes are 0.8mm and 0.6mm, after that at gets a bit too thin.

Using wire and copper in making jewellery gives you endless choices in creativity. Wire allows you the freedom to get creative with twists, turns, and wraps and endless creative shapes can be cut out of copper. I mostly use silver plated wire from Germany, but also love the .20mm copper wire you can buy from electrical shops. It's thicker, firm, but still easy to bend into shapes.

A necklace with Green beads made out of copper wire

If you're interested in using wire in jewellery making, there are many tutorials on the internet, but I found this easy one for a 'Purple Passion Pendant' at Domestic Diva. At 'All Free Jewelry Making' you will also find some useful links.

I use copper sheeting bought by the roll from many craft shops, it's soft and pliable and very easy to work with and the solder takes to it perfectly. 5 Mil (.005 inches thick) 36 gauge, copper is thick enough that it will hold shape pretty well. You cannot tear it with your hands, but it can be be cut with scissors. It is very flexible and pliable. To use in jewellery as is, you have to have something solid backing it, but covering it in solder gives it the necessary rigidity for brooches and pendants. It is perfect for die-cuts and punches. 8 Mil (.008 inches thick) 32 gauge, copper is approximately 11 - 12 times thicker than typical household aluminium foil and 1.5 times thicker than the 5 mil. This is a heavy-duty tooling foil. 8 mil can be cut fairly easily with scissors and is still very pliable and holds its shape a little better than the 5 mil, but to punch it requires quite a bit of pressure. I rarely use 10 mil as it needs to be cut with heavy duty scissors or a utility knife. As with any sheet metal, the edges can be extremely sharp. Be careful when cutting or working with copper sheeting. Whenever I create pieces that have sharp corners, I usually use an old pair of scissors (so I don't worry about ruining them) and trim the corners so that they are slightly rounded.

Here is a fairly easy tutorial on "How to work with copper sheeting".

Hand-made brooch out of copper, wire and silver solder with a clear blue glass jewel in the centre

Two amber glass jewel brooches, the first surrounded with silver solder, the second with silver wire and silver solder and a ring for hanging something

Silver wire brooch with silver wire, filled with silver solder and two seed beads

Red glass jewel brooch with silver wire filled with silver solder

White glass jewel brooch with silver wire and filled with silver solder

An iridescent glass jewel brooch with silver wire and silver solder

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Wire and Iridescent Glass Jewel Brooch

A brooch I made out of silver wire with an iridescent blue glass jewel in the centre. The brooch pin is behind the thick silver solder at the top.

The back of the brooch

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Cosmic Orbit

 'Cosmic Orbit' - Silver wire pendant strung on leather thonging to enhance the earthy feel and matching earrings 

Connect to the Universe from within.

How do you activate the Cosmic Force?
You can use smiling energy. Rub the mid-eyebrow, spiral, and slowly breathe the Cosmic Force in through the mid-eyebrow and the nose. Hold each breath for a while.

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"Faith" pendant

Go ahead: make the leap. Have faith. I’ll be waiting for you on the other side. Here, take my hand…

Silver wire pendant with glass beads hanging from leather thonging for a more earthy connection. Also comes with a silver chain.

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Silver heart pendant on silver chain

A very easy project for beginners starting to work with copper. Cut out a heart-shaped piece of copper and cover with silver solder. Bend some silver wire in a heart shape and place it a bit off-set on the copper heart, soldering together where necessary. A little glass bead dangling from the bottom finishes it off nicely. Hang from a silver chain.

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Rose Quartz Place-name Holder

Rose Quarts set into a shell with silver solder border and a silver wire stand. Can be used as place-name holders at a dinner party or just to hold an inspirational message next to your bed!

Rose quartz is pink quartz that is often called the "Love Stone." It is a stone of unconditional love that opens the heart chakra to all forms of love: self-love, family love, platonic love, and romantic love. The high energy of quartz gives rose quartz the property of enhancing love in virtually any situation. In turn, this lowers stress. All in all it is a very soothing and happy stone.

Emotionally rose quartz brings gentleness, forgiveness, compassion, kindness and tolerance. It raises one's self-esteem and sense of self-worth. It helps balance emotions and heal emotional wounds and traumas, even grief, bringing peace and calm. Rose quartz removes fears, resentments and anger. It can also heal and release childhood traumas, neglect, and lack of love, in part by enhancing inner awareness. It can help with reconciliation with family and others. Overwhelming or unreasonable guilt is eased by rose quartz.

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Unpolished Amethyst Crystal

A raw unpolished Amethyst Cluster, mounted on a silver wire display stand inter-laced with small glass beads. Hand-crafted with Silver wire and silver solder. I just love the feel and look of rough crystals, polishing seems to distract from the beauty of the natural earthiness. In the back-ground is a large piece of raw Rose Quartz crystal.

This is part of my "Earth" collection in my jewellery range "Afrika Street Jewellery".

The Amethyst meaning is spiritual growth and protection. These beautiful healing crystals are also known for bringing clarity of the mind to the owner. By wearing or using Amethyst crystals, you can become more in tune with your own feelings and get to know your inner self on a much deeper level. It is a gemstone which can bring you calmness, inner peace and is thought to heighten your natural intuition.

It is a stone of spirituality and contentment. It brings one the energies of serenity and composure while inciting fairness in decisions and enhancement in the ability to manage any and all responsibilities. It provides the "sense" of common sense and encourages flexibility in decisions. It assists in the assimilation of new ideas.

Clusters – are most useful for cleansing and charging other gemstones or jewellery. They also assist to cleanse negative energy in large areas. These bring group energies together promoting peace and harmony in all relationships.

Amethyst healing properties can relieve pain and swelling throughout the body by calming the nervous system. Amethyst is well known for having a positive affect against insomnia and nightmares. By placing an amethyst crystal under your bed, you can dispel nightmares and encourage lucid dreaming. Amethyst is the birth stone for February. The Amethyst birthstone meaning is also of spiritual growth and protection. If you were born in February, the amethyst powers for healing will vibrate more strongly for you. This is especially true as you hold an amethyst in your hand or wear a piece of amethyst jewellery against your skin.

Amethyst properties
Spiritual awareness, dreaming, dispels nightmares, protection, known as the “sobriety stone”, helps break bad habits. Psychic / Meditation / Protects against anger, hate, envy and fear.

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Bone Pendant and earrings

 

A pendant hand-crafted out of silver wire, silver beads, flat bone beads and long pieces of bone on a silver chain.

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