May's Art Elements component of the month was created by the ultra talented Lesley of Lesley Watt Artisan Elements and of course I forgot to photograph it pre-setting (hence I stole Lesley's photo)!
As soon as I saw my beautiful cab (the little pools of colours are just so amazing) I thought "Oh, what a beautiful brooch this would make" and I set to planing it out.... Thick copper bezel stamped with 'quietly walking along the shore' with a back plate saying 'looking for sea treasures and nothing more' and a really cool swirly pin and a tiny piece of sea glass set on the back as a treasure just for the wearer.
Then of course things started to go wrong!!!
I did not have the right style of wire for the bezel, but thats ok because I'm a problem solving kind of girl so I found some thick copper tubing and rolled it through the pasta machine, perfect! Then I got to stamping it....
So far, so good, I then bent this into a setting, soldered it, cut and stamped the back plate and tried to solder it all in to place.... FAIL, FAIL and FAIL again! It seems that the soldering gods were not with me and possibly my piece was just too big for my tiny torch to heat up and get the solder flowing.
So on to plan two....
If a back plate would not work how about a slightly smaller wire ring around the back of the bezel to hold the cab, it would not need as much heat to make the solder flow and maybe I could change my design into a hair pin?
Well, the wire idea worked but the hair pin idea did not look right at all and it morphed into a necklace!?!
I don't usually work with thick chunky metals, being of the petite size range every thing I normally make is small and delicate but I really love the thick bezel on this piece it gives it a nice solid feel.
The lovely little spacers are by Paradise Beads and go with the cab perfectly, and just look at those lovely little pools of colour!
Art Elements team
Laney Mead
Laney Mead
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