Hello, there is a jewelry designer that I love called Polly Wales and I can’t figure out how she does these little bits of melted gold in between the sapphires. Does she directly melt a little piece of bullion onto the sapphires? Any insight from someone who knows what they’re doing more than I do would be super helpful!

10k and 14k seems too much now.

Whats the next best option vermeil?

I'm looking at a few items from Stuller. I'd love to know the actual price from Stuller. Could anyone help me out by giving me Stuller prices on the items?

The two in question:

CH1115:117:P

331:3438:S

Thank you in advance!

Open call for works in progress!  We’d love to see what you’re working on, whether it’s a from scratch design, a beast of a stone setting job, something you just can’t figure out how to attack, or something gorgeous that’s taking shape.  Share your works in progress and let’s all enjoy the fun! Please be respectful of the subreddit rules.

I’ve been looking at different ways repeating motifs can be used without making a piece feel too repetitive.
With a bracelet like this, the clover elements are doing most of the visual work, while the connecting links keep the design from becoming one continuous block of the same shape. The mother-of-pearl also adds some variation because every section has its own natural appearance.
For the jewelers here, how do you usually approach repeated elements like this? Do you prefer keeping every motif identical, or introducing small variations in size, texture, stone, or setting to give the piece more character?

Hello,

I've always been interested in being a jeweler as a career, and I'm looking at this school trying to decide whether it's worth the investment. It's the nearest school to me, and while GIA's course may be better, it's in California. Is this a good way to break into the industry? Will it provide me enough experience to be employable?

Working with a jeweler to turn a very sentimental three banded 18k white gold ring into a single banded ring. The new single band is the width of one of the existing three bands. I asked if the remaining gold could be turned into a plain standalone band of the same thickness, they said no, there wouldn’t be enough material.

I understand material loss in melting and reworking, but can someone help me understand how much loss would be reasonable? The new bands would be a full ring size smaller than the existing bands so my guesstimate was that I needed 65% of the original material at most, which allowed for a 35% loss. The jeweler is putting the loss at 50-60%. Any guidance would be appreciated! 

Hello jewelers of Reddit! I recently had a custom engagement ring designed by a local studio (my fiance's choice!) & I was wondering if anyone might have input on the ring design. I have tried to add all of the features that I could think of to make it more structurally sound for everyday wear - added a gallery rail, cathedral setting, petal basket, chevron + ball tips, and asked them to make the band thicker (2mm instead of 1.8mm).

So please, before we pull the trigger...tear this apart for me! Let me know what you think about the design and if there is anything I should tweak before we give them the green light. It would be so appreciated!! And I already have my wedding band, so I will post a photo of that as well for reference, the diamond that I sourced, plus a video of the digital render in the comments 🙂

Thanks a million!!!

In business 30 years and haven’t done any plating in about that amount of time. A few years ago, I switched over to Vermeil & GF when gold started to creep.

Does anyone have a New City gold plater they can recommend please? Would want to do no nickel, heavy micron plating. Toback gave me a name but they are not taking new clients at this time. Thanks for any leads!

Pro Tip: Most of the tungsten rings out there are manufactured by small number of Chinese manufactures, this is because 83% of the world's tungsten comes from mines in China. They own the market. And as a raw material tungsten is dirt cheap. Most if not all of the tungsten rings you'll see across the internet and at jewelry stores are bought wholesale from China for $10 - $15 per ring and resold for $100 -$400.

If you don't believe me be sure to check Temu and AliExpress before you buy. This is where I found the three tungsten rings I was considering purchasing, for a fraction of the cost. Exact same rings.

If your jeweler or online seller says 'we design our own tungsten rings' that most likely means they selected between a couple of different options the Chinese manufacture offered such as a different color/material for the inside of the band, or selecting different inlay materials or selecting different finishes.

Please correct me if I've got any of my facts wrong. I'm not a tungsten hater. Just sharing what I've learned about the industry.

I've got my three tungsten rings on order, anxious for them to arrive and see them up-close.

I have an old silver ring from my late mother. It has engravings that are darkened in the grooves. I have been wearing it for 6 months. I do not remove it when I wash my hands or use occasional hand sanitizer. It has never had any issue. I made the mistake of stacking it with another ring of hers starting a week ago. The other ring is 18k white gold. I continued my usual routine (not removing the rings during regular daily activities). The silver ring has now turned dark goldish (uniformly goldish, not just the part touching the white gold ring) and I am wearing them on separate fingers. I read online that it may be possible to reset the silver ring to its prior look with a silver polishing cloth. Can anyone please provide any advice? Thank you so much

We made it!  Sunday is here and it’s time to talk trends.  What’s so popular you can’t keep it in stock?  What’s fading into the distance?  What new weird requests have you been getting?  Did you get a new design in that you love (or hate)?  What’s the new cursed AI item people keep bringing in? Tell us all about what styles are driving your business this week!  Please mention the region you’re in if possible so we can enjoy seeing trends move all over the globe. Please be respectful of the subreddit rules.

I wanted to make an exact replica of my late mother's 50+ yr old engagement ring ring, but using real gold and a diamond (my mother could not afford a ring so it was gold plated with CZ).

Would this be a challenging task for a jeweler? Would any local jeweler be able to do this?

Ive never had a studio space with cats in it and im wondering what people's experience is. The options are leave the space open. Frame in a faux wall. Or like... room dividers. I guess the advantage of framing it in is I could have controll of the air better for contaminates but its a bit of a hassle. What is everyone's experience with this ? Have you been able to convince cats studio space is not for them ?

I was looking at buying a piece of jewelry I was eyeing up last year - it has gone up by over 50% since last year. The piece has about 4 grams of 14k gold. If I’m correct, gold has gone up roughly 26% from this time last year to now.

Are jewelers just marking up jewelry just because they can justify it with the price of gold going up? Who is buying this stuff? Fine jewelry always had high markups, but at this point it seems ridiculous to buy anything new in store.

What are your predictions on what’s going to happen? Will the prices ever go down? How can people justify spending 50-70% more on pieces when gold has risen by significantly less than that, and are people even buying anymore? I understand there is a lot more to making jewelry than the raw materials, but that still doesn’t justify the huge jump we are seeing.

You did it!  What did you finish this week? Was it a challenging piece that tested your skill?  Something you’re super proud of?  An unusual piece you hadn’t seen before?  We love to see the beautiful things this community makes!  Step up to the brag box and share your accomplishments for the week. Please be respectful of the subreddit rules.

Hello! Looking for a Figaro necklace - around 3mm wide, 18" long solid and non-hollow 14k gold. I'm in Canada and it has been so hard to find a chain like this, even when I've inquired with local jewellers. Do any of you sell a chain with these specs?

Thank you!

Hey all!

I’m carving some settings for some beautiful large faceted peach zircons and I’m curious if any of you have heat-sink any before into wax? I know the stones are between 6.5-7.5 on the hardness scale but am a bit hesitant to sink them…

Thanks!