{Candie Cooper's Journal}

New Jewelry Book on the Shelf...

Man, oh man this book is super cool!  It's by Linda Kopp who was also the editor for Metalworking 101 for Beaders.  It's called the Jewelry Design Challenge because all of the designers were sent the same materials to create one piece of jewelry for the book.  We could do whatever we wanted with the materials plus add one "wild card" material---this element made the challenge even more fun.  I chose fiber/felt.  I was really inspired and intrigued on so many variations with the same materials.  Here's a little snippet of my piece in the book...that looks way better in the actual book.  Shooting on polka-dots...what was I thinking?

A True Love of Mine...

He smells and smells some more and I absolutely love him anyway.  He is the Pig Pen of patinas.  Liver of Sulphur.  Sigh.  I use this patina pretty much any chance I can.  I've even finished a piece that I really didn't much care for only to throw a Hail Mary Liver of Sulphur Patina on it that ended up winning the game.  Or in this case saving an ugly piece of jewelry.  Here's a little tutorial I did showing how to highlight textured or stamped metal way back in the Candie Cast days that I wanted to move over to this blog.  It's an ol' faithful technique so here goes:  

The small can with the tweezers on top is filled with the liver of sulphur chunks.  Keep all water drips away from your can of LOS, one drop can ruin the whole can and that's a real bummer!  It's worth mentioning that these days liver of sulphur comes in many forms like gel or pre mixed. Missy here learned it with the chunks so that's what she's stickin' to.

Make sure your piece is free of dirt and oil or else the patina won't take to the surface. Clean it with dish soap and a tooth brush, maybe even some pumice powder. Dip the piece into the solution or leave it to obtain black.  Copper and silver both go through lots of colors when dipped in the solution.  Rinse it at anytime to keep the color you like.  

Wet your thumb and then dip it into pumice powder.  Rub the pumice powder on the surface to remove the patina leaving the LOS in the recessed areas.  Rinse when finished.

Here's another true love.  Brass the Brush.  Get one from a jewelry supply store---not those vicious bristled things in the furniture refinishing section of the hardware store.  You know the ones--short and cute on the outside. Wet the brush and add a drop of dish soap.

Brush.  Brush. Brush.  Brush.  Rinse.  Snap.

I added some small dots around the square with a center punch for fun.  You can apply liver of sulphur to silver plated findings as well.  I do that a lot because I love that gunmetal color.  It's just one more way to make it your own too.

Rocker is here on my lap.  He needs a bath.  Bad.  My hair is standing on end.  I need a shower.  Bad.  Well wait, lets get you a pic...

It was impossible to get my chicken head hair and him in the shot.  You can imagine the hair and Rocker is way more cute.  He buries his head in my arm I think to block out the light.  Oh, this dog.  It's time to get cleaned up and down to the studio.  I love you for stopping by.