earrings & things

On July 14, Martha and I visited Patrica at her house for a PMC (Precious Metal Clay) day ... we each made a pair of Fine Silver earrings (some of us made more!) It was easier in some ways and harder in others than you might think. Here are a few pics.


Martha & Patricia


Martha & Me


Martha's earrings ... these are actually 3 layers of silver, regardless of the gold color of this photo. Sorry this is so blurry!


Patricia used a patina on her earrings ... they turned out gorgeous!


Mine ... no patina ... I liked the matte silver look.

PMC for Me

I took a PMC (Precious Metal Clay) class this weekend, along with my friend Patricia, and we had a blast learning all the "ins and outs" of dealing with this easy-but-finicky medium. We'd been wanting to learn about it for a while, and this was the first class we could find here in Houston.

PMC, once fired, is .999 pure silver ... purer than sterling, and a little bit softer. These are my first efforts ... not exactly professional, but I'm pleased enough with them to share them here. Definitely more to come!


Above are the pieces, fresh from the flame, with no antiqueing added. They've just been brushed with a brass brush to take down some of the bright shine.


Next the pieces are shown after being taken from the Liver of Sulphur solution. The color in this image isn't exactly true, but pretty close. I didn't like the gold-y color, and so wanted to go back to the more silvery tone.





And above is the final version ... most of the Liver of Sulphur has been brushed away with the brass brush, leaving only a little darkening in the crevasses, which I like better. The penny is shown for size reference.

Some day I'm going to learn the secret for photographing shiny stuff indoors. Sorry for the poor images, especially of the large pendant. It has a rolled self-bail that's actually kind of neat.