I had the privilege of meeting Mr. Lewton-Brain at the 2010 Bead & Button Show in Milwaukee. He's a very nice gentleman, and it was great to see him in person, and exchange a few pleasantries. He's also one of the founders of a wonderful website for jewelry artisans, called Ganoksin , which means 'orchid'. If you've never been to Ganoksin, it's definitely a website you'll want to visit. There's tons of information on jewelry fabrication, including videos, and it's all free!
Back to the Tropical Leaf earrings --- I started by cutting out the basic leaf shape from sterling sheet, then folded it in half after first annealing the metal. Annealing means to heat with a torch, then quench, or cool, in water. This makes the metal soft (for metal, that is) and bendable. After folding it in half, I began repeated cycles of hammering along the non-fold edge, alternating with annealing the metal.
After a course of hammering, the metal becomes work hardened, and becomes stiff and brittle. Annealing changes the molecular structure of the metal, making it maleable again. When I'd completed this cycle 4 times, I carefully opened each leaf, and it arced into a lovely leaf shape along the spine. I used pliers to carefully manipulate the edges of the leaf, creating extra folds.
The next step was melting the end of a 20 gauge sterling wire to form a little ball at the end, then soldering it on the front of the leaf, to create a stem, which is also the earwire. Some more shaping, filing, sanding, polishing, and patinating, and the earrings were complete.
If you're interested in learning more about fold forming, Mr. Lewton-Brain has written a wonderful book on the topic, called Foldforming it's available at Amazon, among other places.
