Pearl Brooch

I spent a long time figuring out what to make for Metamorphosis 30! Lizette had these opals that I really wanted to use but I just couldn’t figure out how to incorporate their asymmetrical shapes into any designs that would suit her. She also had a few pearls and it made me think of all the lonely pearls we all have but don’t know what to with! How many of you have a bag of random pearls (mostly single earrings because you lost the partner)? Exactly!

Lizette loves brooches which made the choice of what type of jewellery to make easy. To make this brooch, I soldered a bunch of settings together and then soldered them into a hammered silver ring. Then I added the brooch pin and set the pearls. I would have liked to make it a convertible brooch to pendant but with the open back design, that wouldn’t work. (Note: the brooch pin can’t be seen when the brooch is being worn!)

Yellow Gold Brooch

I've never made a brooch before so I was looking forward to adding this project to my repertoire!

I accidentally deleted the photo of Margo's bracelet but it looked like the sample below.

One of the first things I noticed about Margo when I met her is that she always wears interesting matching accessories. And she wears a lot of brooches and makes them look super stylish.

To make her brooch, I melted her gold into a half inch by 6mm ingot. After I rolled it out (to 0.8mm), I started cutting out pieces in the shape of windshields that were then soldered together to create a conical marquise and pear-shape pieces. The windshield-shape is what creates the cone-shape.

Once I had a selection of sizes, I soldered all of them together and added the brooch mechanism which I also mostly made by hand (I purchased the pin catch - the thing on the left that the pin fits into). A little filing and polishing later and the brooch was complete!