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How To Make Beatiful Fork Jewelry

As a metalsmith and art jeweler, I keep a tight lookout on the art jewelry market. As an author of jewelry making books, I’m also always looking for ways for my readers to enhance their skills and knowledge. Curating art jewelry exhibits has also made it very clear to me that no matter what type of jewelry one makes, it needs to be original, unique, to withstand constant market shifts. The bottom line for successful jewelry sales is obviously excellent hand skills and craftsmanship, originality of design tips the sales scales most favorably. Being able to catch a trend like the newest one on jewelry made from utensils can also give any art jeweler a leg up in the sales arena. Have you considered trying to make jewelry from forks?

While the jewelry industry is fast moving, it’s possible to stay in step with it by always providing new and fresh designs. It’s often a real challenge to come up with fresh ideas for your art jewelry on a regular basis. On occasion, it just makes good sense to go out on a limb and add something to your jewelry line that’s completely fresh or new. Like fork jewelry.

When testing a new addition of jewelry to a line, it makes good sense to do it with an item that is production conscious and that doesn’t take too long to make. If you do that, you won’t have invested large amounts of your time before knowing if the new piece will sell. This is a strategy I used many times with considerable success. Selling out of a new addition to your line can be both frustrating (since you don’t have more to sell on the spot) as well as thrilling (it’s a hit!). But it’s a prudent business strategy as well and can give you the best type of market information you can possibly have.

My writing on selling jewelry in this tough economic climate have been crystallized by a recent review on the DVD, Making Fork Jewelry, by Maryanne Cherubino. To succeed in art jewelry, you need to think smart and focus on being cost effective as well as creative. So, catching one of the latest trends in art jewelry, Ms. Cherubino is right on the money with her fork jewelry making DVD. Savvy to emerging market and fashion trends, Ms. Cherubino provides excellent training in her DVD on how to make both fork bracelets and necklaces.

You could probably jump right off your seat and start making these gorgeous bracelets and necklaces after watching the hour long DVD. She quickly and deftly takes you thru the very simple steps of hammering, bending, polishing and grinding. You finish by adding your choice of centerstone and then bend the bracelet into its’ final shape. Amazing!

To facilitate quick learning and absorption of the information, Ms. Cherubino then makes a second, slightly different, bracelet repeating all steps in the fabrication process. This all makes it tough to miss anything with the way she’s presented the instruction. As a final touch, Maryann then shows you how to alter the process to make a pendant/necklace. A real benefit for beginners here is that no heating or annealing of the fork is needed to make these gorgeous pieces.

The real attraction to making fork jewelry is that it can be rather hard to tell that these unique pieces are made from our own utensils. There’s a lot of room to add and inject your own creativity into these lovely pieces. Bend the tines of the fork any direction you choose. Use your own design preferences to surround and encase your center stone. Bend the fork tines into either a sinewy, fluid direction or a linear one instead. Impose your own signature design style to this very simple,fast and easy method of making art jewelry.

Aside from the wisdom of adding new items like fork jewelry to your art jewelry line, this kind of art jewelry is highly cost effective and more importantly, very fast and simple to make. The gorgeous embellishments on existing contemporary or antique forks are already done for you. In addition to that, with the high price of metals these days, finding inexpensive sterling forks can be a real bonus. Seriously, after having watched this DVD on Making Fork Jewelry, I realized that one could actually make several of these pieces in a day. It’s hard to find a jewelry technique that offers that kind of potential rapid production with a good retail price to boot.

If this sounds intriguing to you, Ms. Cherubino offers a quicky video on her site that’s well worth watching if you’re considering becoming an art jeweler. The DVD, Making Fork Jewelry: How To Make Amazingly Unique Fork Bracelets and Necklaces is more than sufficient for even a beginner to start making these distinctive pieces immediately. Well done.

Designing Jewelry

Before you start making your own jewelry, designing and planning is important.  When you plan, always remember that you’ve got to be organized in all aspects as you go along with your jewelry making.  Required tools and material are critical ; however, you do not just grab those things as you need them.  Sometimes we mess up by trying the incorrect materials ; an example of this is when we selected the wrong beads and finishing up with a mess, a complete waste of your time and materials.  So, it is very important to chose the right kind of materials you’ll be using, or rather selected a high quality of materials which will last long without fading. 

The most common materials are handmade glass beads, gemstones, and other metal materials that come in various sizes, colors, and varieties.  They are the most beautiful materials that make up your jewelry.  However looks can be deceiving.  Beads are beautiful tiny pieces, but if you aren’t wise enough to pick high quality beads, you could finish up with faded beads.  Gemstones and other metal materials, if carefully looked after, will last many lifetimes, but others do not.  Sometimes high quality beads, gemstones, and other metal materials are far more expensive to buy, but it really pays when you realize that they can last for a lifetime! 

But if you’re planning to make fun and trendy designs, you can go with the less expensive materials.  Finding out how to source the best wholesale jewelry is best done online through places such as eBay. 

As beads and other materials come in different sizes, choosing the right size for your design is very important too.  You do not want to choose heavy beads to pull off the design shape of your necklace.  Heavy beads could cause tiara tips bending over in your jewelry.  Very light beads can look flimsy and will not go with your desired designed shape. 

Making a dramatic design statement typically comes with lots of massive beads; in this case you can incorporate hollow metal beads, wood or other light weight materials, which will help you make the completed item from being too heavy to wear.  There are lots of light weight beads that look stunning, Bali silver beads are a excellent example of this. 

The point of the beads is really essential if you are designing a special bead effect for your jewelry.  Add a dramatic touch which will make a certain bead stand out .  Others use organic designs, composed of beads that blend together giving an overall beautiful cohesive impression, so selecting beads that are similar in color tone and sizes are very important things to do. 

After having completed a number of items, and probably planning on selling them, you can come up with this equation for your pricing: value of the beads + your time + expenses and other materials.  There are many places that you can sell your jewelry : craft shows, home parties and you can find out all about setting up your online jewelry store by searching the Net for ideas.

SImple Jewelry Gifts You Can Make

As the holidays get closer, we know there will be some people we want to give presents to.If you are on a tight budget, what can you give?   Well, you can make them a gift!

A simple thing you can create is jewelry.Jewelry is a gift that can be used longer than baked goods. Additionally, sometimes it is even cheaper.   Here are 2 easy types of jewelry to make: beaded earrings or bracelets.  Earrings are usually cheaper to make as there are less beads involved.  However, sometimes the beads used to make bracelets are really inexpensive.  And of course, you can always make a matching set! So lets go over how to make jewelry!

Getting Started

First you need to get supplies.Craft stores like ArtBeads, Micheals, and Joanns should carry everything you need.  For either project you need: beads, round nose pliers and wire cutters.  For earrings you will also want earwires, headpins and tweezers; for bracelets, you need memory wire.Most crafters will create both types of jewelry for some extra variety.

Remember that fancier beads will make fancier jewelry.  Sometimes you can get freshwater pearls rather inexpensively that makes wonderful jewelry.

Making The Jewelry

Both types of jewelry need loops to be created.Use your round nose pliers to create these.Wirecutters make trimming off extra wire a snap.

For earrings:  add beads to each headpin, close off headpin with a loop and attach the loop to the earwires' loop.

For bracelets: create a starting loop, add beads, and then close it off with a loop.

Nice Touches

Putting the earrings on cardboard or a blank business card makes them look more professional.   Having the earrings or bracelet in a small plastic baggie helps make certain that the beautiful jewelry won't be damaged.  If you have extra jewelry boxes around, these help even more.

Enjoy giving these great gifts!