Blue Spinel Ring 2

Blue Spinel is such a vibrant color. I made the ring shank using seaweed which has this amazing wavy texture. It is off the beach in front of my house. I pressed the mold I made from the seaweed into a thick strip of fresh silver clay and cut the sides to be parallel. The strip was wound on a ring mandrel. This was dried and refined. Using a sharp knife I pierced and made a hole in the ring shank to let the light through.

I had already prepared the blue spinel stone with a collar of silver clay, dried it and refined it. This was adhered to the ring shank using syringe silver clay. The stone was positioned on top of the hole I had made in the clay so that light could shine through the stone. After drying and refining it was fired in the kiln for 2 hours at 1650 degrees F. A beautiful silver ring with a bright blue stone emerged. 

I burnished 24K Gold foil onto the pure silver shank near the base of the stone, as well as the bezel surrounding the stone, to make the blue of the stone shine even more. This is an ancient Korean technique called Keum Boo. The gold surrounding the brilliant blue of the stone is stunning.

This ring could be worn by anyone.

The ring size is 10.