In the Studio Visit series, see how well-known jewelry makers equip and organize their workspaces. Get inspired and build your own dream studio.
After 30 years in the jewelry industry working as a bench jeweler, sales professional, manager and owner, Michael Gerwig had a very clear image of how he wanted to establish and build his new store in Fayetteville, AR. He envisioned Michael-Seigler Jewelry ‘ Design as a unique jewelry design and custom manufacturing salon built exclusively on the foundation of CAD/CAM technology.
John Marshall was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania in 1936. After serving in the Armed Forces and doing construction work, Marshall began his college study in 1958 with one year of business administration. By 1960 his attention had been redirected to…
In the Ojibway language, Toronto means “meeting place.” At this site on the northern shore of Lake Ontario 18th-century French and English traders met native Indians to barter for fur pelts. Today Toronto is a city of over two million…
http://TitaniumRingsForever.com and Chris Boothe demonstrate the coloring of titanium and niobium through electrical anodizing. A process combining science and art, it is used in the creation of titanium wedding rings and other titanium jewelry. When electricity is used to create…
I have met a few cockatoos in my day, but on this day, in early June, I met Sunny and FlaxMan, two Umbrella Cockatoos who help run wildpen, an Etsy shop where they sell handmade (er… beak- and talon-made) gifts….
Beth Wicker is a member of the Artisans of the South Carolina Cotton Trail. She currently resides in Cheraw, South Carolina.
We need your metal to realize our Nuit Blanche 2009 installation of 10,000 metal objects symbolizing the hours of dedication and practice needed to become a master craftsman. If you really want to send us brass knuckles please make sure…
Artist-goldsmith Charles Lewton-Brain describes his approach to jewellery-making and how he finds inspiration in nature. Governor General’s Awards in Visual and Media Arts 2012
Clasp with an eagle and its prey Gold, turquoise inlay Parthian (Iran) ca. A.D. 1st2nd century This solid gold ornament is in the form of a roundel with two projecting elements that have slots for the attachment of a strap….
I made this tube coiling device based on a post by David Cruickshank. The drawbench I made up myself.
From 2012-2013 Gucci Japan produced an online video series called “Hand” that payed homage to 35 artists and designers who eschew modern mass-production in favor of traditional techniques.
We bring you this video featuring Gil, a former jackhammer operator who now grinds and fuses glass. zulasurfing is comprised of husband and wife duo, Gil and Irena, based in New York. Gil is originally from Israel and Irena was…
We manufacture jewellery by hand. In this video we share some insight on the process of making an emerald ring. Enjoy.
Bruce Metcalf has dedicated almost forty years of his life to the creation and historiography of American Studio Craft. He makes his exquisite jewelry with the utmost care and precision. On average most of the pieces take two months to…
Hidden Hazards in the Art Studio – Less Toxic Alternatives
How to use rolling mills
Produced by Auriou Toolworks, this 10-minute video reveals the fascinating world of traditional rasp-making at Forge De Saint Juery in France. Since 1858, Auriou Toolworks has been making free forged hand tools for wood, stone, and plaster. This video will…
La Desirade – Bijouterie, atelier artisan joaillier
After a long break we have restarted the JSW Enamel Studio, Vashind, Mumbai. A major effort was made in October 2004 to set up this facility for large scale enamel on steel with the combined efforts of Ms. Sangita Jindal…
The Enamel Foundation provides the furnace and offers the use of their standard workshop tools, equipment and workshop enamels. (A word about workshop enamels, considering the investment of time and expenses, one might want to supply his/her enamels from home…
Set in Style: The Jewelry of Van Cleef & Arpels, the most comprehensive exhibition ever organized of Van Cleef & Arpels’ masterworks. This unprecedented assembly of 350 pieces from Van Cleef & Arpels’ collection and international private collections, augmented by…
I first discovered Allan Adler’s Silversmithing Shop about 23 years ago when I arrived in Southern California to begin my metalsmithing teaching career at California State University, Long Beach. His shop was located on Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood; and I…
Entering the enameling studio, one is struck by its openness. Light fills the space. Shelves are lined with organic vessel forms and dense architectural silhouettes. Glass and pools of color illuminate the density of these shapes, creating a light of…
This stop motion film has been created with the metal contributed to the Nuit Blanche 10,000 Hours project. An installation of 10,000 metal objects symbolizing the hours of dedication needed to master an art or craft. Visit http://www,metalartsguild.ca to learn…
From 2012-2013 Gucci Japan produced an online video series called “Hand” that payed homage to 35 artists and designers who eschew modern mass-production in favor of traditional techniques.
From 2012-2013 Gucci Japan produced an online video series called “Hand” that payed homage to 35 artists and designers who eschew modern mass-production in favor of traditional techniques.
From 2012-2013 Gucci Japan produced an online video series called “Hand” that payed homage to 35 artists and designers who eschew modern mass-production in favor of traditional techniques.
My silver jewelry art
My jewelry art
I have met a few cockatoos in my day, but on this day, in early June, I met Sunny and FlaxMan, two Umbrella Cockatoos who help run wildpen, an Etsy shop where they sell handmade (er… beak- and talon-made) gifts….
zulasurfing is comprised of husband and wife duo, Gil and Irena, based in New York. Gil is originally from Israel and Irena was born in Russia. They fashion a variety of brilliant jewelry pieces in their small, but well equipped…
For the Love of Jewelers. Award-winning independent jewelers Robin Waynee and Ryan Roberts open up their studio to give us a glimpse at their process behind their work. Both are Spectrum and Saul Bell Design Award winners who have reached…
For the Love of Jewelers. Go inside the studio of award-winning jewelry artist, Argentium expert and beloved instructor Ronda Coryell to learn a little about how she got her start in the industry and what it is about making jewelry…
Sometime around 1989 or 1990, I got a call from a friend, Steve Kissler, who owned a small gift shop in Old Town, Mariemont, Ohio. The store was called The Shaker Seed Box and featured furniture, boxes and accessories made…
Irony & Aluminum The hidden beauty of the can’s polished aluminum surface is revealed. By hand, I apply dents to sculpt patterns of shapes onto the can’s surface. The designs are made possible by the structural properties of the cylinder…
We believe it starts with the spark of an idea. And becomes the insatiable desire to turn that idea into a work of wearable art. To shape metal into a thing of beauty. To transform nature’s raw elements into something…
Silver studio art project
Spinning a silver chalice base. Ditchling, East Sussex
Eric Olson from Indiana’s News Center interviews Steve Shelby in his workshop about how he makes his metal sculptures.
Take a quick tour through Melissa Muir’s Studio for tips and tricks in organizing tools and materials.
The show season had come and gone. With my kids still in school, I was unable to participate in the winter fairs in Flordia. I made a promise to myself to find somewhere to put my art. So for the…
Studio Jewelers Sabbatical. You know the feeling. No matter what you do there’s never enough time! Well, after 17 very long years I finally managed to “buy” some. Here is how, and why, I did it. Where it will lead…
Abrasha occupies about 300 square feet of neat, well organized space. Unlike many jewelers, who make do with garages, kitchen tables, barns, and industrial offices, often characterized by a lack of light, he enjoys a corner office with large picture windows. Against the walls are an office desk, jewelers’ workbenches, and fabrication equipment, and in the center are more heavy-duty items, such as rolling Milk, a lathe, and milling machine; most are old but still in fine working condition.
Some artists leave the big city reluctantly, chased out by high rents. For Owen Sound, Canada-based jewelers Andrew Goss and Sandra Noble Goss, living away from an urban center was a conscious choice that has driven their careers. The pair left Toronto in 1973, and haven’t looked back since.
Keeping a life in balance isn’t easy, and for the studio artist it’s a push-pull between dealing with the outside world and making time and space for creativity. California artist Christina smith manages to do both, at the price of working a back-breaking schedule. During the day, the friendly and outgoing Smith is an assistant professor at California State University, Fullerton. After more than 20 years in the academic salt mines, she’s now on the tenure track, teaching beginning crafts in addition to undergraduate and graduate level metalsmithing.
Consisting of three small rooms crammed with tooks, boxes, and books (including a spare bathroom complete with shower stall/patina spray booth), the studio is part and parcel of Eids home. This is not a grand sanctuary, it is the workspace of someone who has carved time and place out of a full family life. By the confines of the available square footage, the studio seems to have grown like a bonsai tree: small yet fully formed. The bench space is painfully tiny and the soldering area appears totally inadequate considering the scale of the commissions Eid produces. But, whether it is through disciplined and methodical work habits or by an ability to just “make do,” Eid creates pieces that defy this constriction and exist fully and beautifully in large and magnificent spaces.
The intimate bond between Brush’s creative and personal life is evident upon entering his Manhattan loft. The kitchen and dining area abut a well-equipped machine shop, while bedrooms peak out from behind a white gallery wall. The loft’s dominant feature is the vast expanse of red maple floor, which serves a surprisingly key role in Brush’s artistic process.
Upon reaching the porch of Daniel Joczs Cambridge studio and home, I recalled having been there briefly for a party during one of Mass Arts successful symposiums more than seven years earlier. Jocz and I met again at Haystacks New Works workshop last September. For five days the school becomes for former faculty what it is to students, a place to explore and experiment, or simply work without the everyday interruptions of business or teaching. Jocz was exiled from the metals shop because he brought a new series of aluminum bracelets to be worked on. Aluminum is a contaminant to silver/goldsmithing studios and it was my job, as the studio tech, to boot him out.
Sarah’s Way is the name of the short dirt road leading up to Wilson’s studio and home. He, his wife mixed-media artist Jennifer Morrow Wilson, their eight-year-old daughter Sarah, and ‘Dog’ the dog live here. It is a two-story wooden frame home that Doug and Jennifer designed and built themselves..
With barely a square inch unoccupied, Fensters studio is tightly
packed into that basement space. The setup reflects the breadth of
his love affair with metal, with areas designated for spinning and
other lathe work, forming, raising, fabrication, soldering,
annealing, and polishing. He has a huge selection of hammers and
stakes displayed on the wall. There is even a shower, in case work
gets especially messy.
Remote by design, the home and studio of Gary Noffke do indeed take you to that ‘other place.’ Once you have cleared the formidable driveway, you are on a rise that resonates with the echoes of the active creek below. The smell of fresh ginger in the garden, combined with the cool provided by the numerous shade trees of all varieties, almost makes you believe you are not in.
Most jewelers and sculptors are quite satisfied to have one studio of their own. Between them, Jack and Marilyn da Silva have four — each have one for their day jobs, Jacks Metals Design Studio in El Sobrante, California is a third, and then there is their favorite place of all, affectionately known as The Shed.
Jeffrey Herman is an accomplished silversmith, master of holloware repair, and the founding director of the Society of American Silversmiths. His live/work space includes areas devoted to each of these specialties. The front door opens into a 25 by 40 foot open area that comprises living room, kitchen, drafting, and office spaces. The ceilings soar 13 feet above. Large windows frame a sunset view. The floors in this former brewery are marvelous old hardwood that has been polished and varnished, adding warmth, character, and a smooth surface for scooting around on a wheeled desk chair.
Artist’s with shared sensibilities and needs often come together to form co-operative studios in order to reduce overhead, share equipment, and develop a greater sense of community. In 1989, with these goals in mind, Paulette Werger, Lynn Whitford, and Agnes Chwae, three friends who had been in graduate school together at the University of Wisconsin-Madison metals program, formed Metalpeople in Madison. Jeweler Jim Charneski, whose background and training was in the jewelry trade, soon joined the group.
Safety is key in Milt Fischbein’s studio. Milt Fischbein of Milt Fischbein Metal Arts in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, recently moved his 20-year-old business into a new studio location. While he reused most of what he had in his original studio, he was…
Set in a deeply wooded area of Bethesda, Maryland, Namu Chos brick house at first appears to be similar to those of his neighbors. Yet this resemblance stops abruptly at his front door, hand carved with an imposing image of two eagles, the larger one looking outward in a protective pose with a smaller eagle looking inward. This gilded image heralds the powers that await inside.
At Nanopod Hybrid Studio in Toronto, owner and chief alchemist Tosca Terran forms metal and glass into elegant adornments of otherworldly beauty. Under her leadership students learn to manipulate materials, and follow her path in the creation of decidedly unusual jewelry. Located in a storefront on a busy corridor in Torontos Annex area, the studio is also a retail outlet for Terrans work. Behind glass windows frosted with the swirling tentacle designs that are part of the Nanopod “look,” lies a compact 400-square-foot space that is a veritable beehive of activity; an appropriate metaphor, considering the uncanny organic feel of Terrans work..
Although Patty Spiro of Live Oak Studios in Chipley, Florida, doesn’t earn a living making jewelry full time, you wouldn’t know that by looking at her studio. She and her husband have transformed a spare bedroom in their octagon-shaped house…
The anvil anchors his studio. Rows of hammers and tools along one long wall communicate with the storage of rolling stock on another. Hung from the ceiling, a forged iron spike pierces a fluted-edge home of newspaper. That is a Joyce sculpture, exploring the confluence of the long-lived and the temporal. Two Piranesi prints of Roman ruins appear to have taken on the aura of the studio-ash and patina being by-products both of the particular and the universal realm of ideas Joyce mines at the anvil.
When Theo Janson and Vanessa Compton moved into the winding basement studio space on Toronto’s Markham Street in May 1978, they were not thinking that a short four years would find them moving again to a larger windowed storefront, that…
Seattle native Shawn Taylor of prasseindesignstudio is sharing her process of making a wooden wrist cuff with us in conjunction with our themes of woodworking and jewelry making. As a designer, Shawn works with architects designing spaces, and she applies…
Reviving the virtually dead enameling technique plique-à-jour, which means “the light of day as seen through a membrane,” has been a challenge to Jean Sampel and Susan Noland since the late 1960s. Their interest in this technique, perfected by the…
It may surprise some, judging from Tom Markusen studio output, that the production objects are handmade, without the use of dyes, props or molds. The objects are smithed straight from the forge, from red to black heat, from the mid-section…
From 2012-2013 Gucci Japan produced an online video series called “Hand” that payed homage to 35 artists and designers who eschew modern mass-production in favor of traditional techniques.
A short documentary film that follows classical Japanese metal artist Ford Hallam as he recreates a lost masterpiece by the 19th century Mito tsuba artist, Hagia Katsuhira. The project and filming was funded by Mr Bob Morrison and took place…
A short documentary film that follows classical Japanese metal artist Ford Hallam as he recreates a lost masterpiece by the 19th century Mito tsuba artist, Hagia Katsuhira. The project and filming was funded by Mr Bob Morrison and took place…
The studio of Natalia Gomensoro, aka Metalnat, walks the line of serene organization and cluttered potential. Natalia grew up in Uruguay and comes to jewelry with a background in design and architecture. She got started making jewelry in 1994 and…
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