Oh boy! Jewelry making is so much a Choose Your Own Adventure type dealie. Wire work? Beading? Metalsmithing? Metal clay? Chain mail? Fabrication? Cold connections or learn to solder? Make your own findings or go total DIY?
I started by saying several times out loud, “Man, I’d love to try my hand at making jewelry.” I said it so many times, my son got me a box of beading beads, a small package of craft wire and this book: Complete Guide To Making Wire Jewelry
It was no where near complete but, man, it got me hooked.
I’d like to second the recommendation of Fire Mountain Gems. Both the print catalogs and the website are great sources of inspiration, and they offer an amazing variety of jewelry-making goodies at reasonable prices.
And browse etsy, just for the fun of it (but have someone you trust hold your credit cards while you do!)
Once in a while, you find something that makes you want to pick up the beads and wire you haven’t looked at in a year, 'cause Holy Crap! [del]you[/del] I just HAVE to try making that!
(Mine will be sad and misshapen, and nowhere near $333 worth, but it will be MINE!)
Yet another vote for Fire Mountain Gems…besides the very reasonable prices, they have a wide variety of materials. If you have a local bead store, I highly recommend a visit there too…there’s nothing quite like seeing so many beads in one place! The one I used to visit (which still exists as a warehouse space) had baskets scattered throughout the store that contained “leftovers” – stray beads, partial strands, and so on. I LOVE sorting through stuff like that…I’ve found some really cool beads that way.
You could always try a bead show; they can be a bit overwhelming if you don’t know exactly what you’re after though. Also, some of the attendees can be quite rude (I almost got into a fight with a lady who mistook my basket for a clearance bin).
ETA: Speaking of hoarding (:D), sometimes you will finish your project and find that you have one or two beads left. Apparently, some people throw these away. Don’t do that…trust me, you will eventually find a use for them!
While we’re all here, I’m looking for a good book on the basics for my 9 year old niece. She loves playing around with the limited supplies my mom keeps around and she has a really good eye for color, shape and scale for a kid that age. I want to encourage her by getting her some beading supplies and tools of her own for Christmas, but she doesn’t really have access to someone who knows anything about the subject to help her with the technical aspects, so she’s going to need a pretty good reference book. Most of what I’ve found so far is more along the lines of “this is the pattern to make this piece” than “here’s what a jump ring is for and how you use it.”
Maybe not exactly what you’re after, but lost wax casting works quite well for making small jewelry like pendants, rings and stuff like that. I had a couple of courses where we did bronze casts, and it was quite simple; make a wax model, coat it in ceramics to create a shell, melt the wax out and fasten ceramic cup to the shell containing the metal, then heat it with a blowtorch until the bronze is melted and flip it. Cool off in water and hammer the ceramics off.
If you’re interested I’ll see if I can find more detailed descriptions on the net.
Come to Tucson the second week in February for the gem and mineral show. There are vendors from all over the world and the thing takes over the whole town. You’ll go nuts.
I came in here to say that I learned wirework/wire wrapping from the lapidary society in my area. There’s no lapidary society where I live now, but there is a flourishing community college Adult Ed set of classes that includes both beading/wire wrapping and metalworking (soldering, casting, etc.), which I love. I think my sister learned beadwork from a local bead store.
I like All Wired Up for basic wirework techniques. I’ve also heard good things about Bead on a Wire, although it’s not the type of stuff I’m that interested in, so I only skimmed it. This is the kind of thing where it can vary greatly from person to person how useful the book is, though, so it’s probably a good idea to look through it a bit if possible before you buy it. (Try your library, too.)
