A Foray into Rings

If at first you don't succeed try try try again!  My foray into rings is a work in progress.  With each ring I make I am getting closer to my ideal design, but until then I am learning from my misdirections.

My plan was to do something similar to the bracelet design, so the supplies are roughly the same.  However I also learned that I needed to add a ring shaper to my tools for the future (something like the copper stick below)--for the time being I improvised with a couple of highlighters/fat pens and repeatedly trying the rings on.

Supplies (previously purchased at Beads on Fifth or off Ebay):

• Wire cutter
• 18 gauge wire (gold color copper; tarnish resistant craft wire from Bead Smith)
• 28 gauge wire (14kt gold filled)
• Semi-precious rough cut garnets
• Rhodonite round pink beads
• Rough cut dyed jade

Ring 1

First I wound the 18 gauge wire so it overlapped 2 full times and then for about a cm 3 times.  Nexy I wound the 28 gauge wire around the doubled 18 gauge base.  I position where I anchored the three stone beads over the tripled up 18 gauge wire.  I think that creates a more streamlined look since that area of the ring is already distinct from the rest of the circle.  I found because the tripled up area was small that I had to do some extra wrapping of the beads to anchor them properly and avoid the ring base from continuously increasing in size.

The finished product, ring 1.  While I think it worked out well, in the future I'd like the reduce the "bulk" of the anchoring of the stones.  I much prefer a more streamlined look.  This may requiring looping through the bead twice to create a firm attachment.


Ring 2
This was my attempt to address the issue of expanding ring size.  This design contemplates a third full loop of the 18 gauge wire, but I decided to play around with the wrapping of the 28 gauge to create some interest.  I alternated between wrapping the top two and the bottom two wires.  While I do think this helped a lot with reducing risk of expansion, I am not in love with the resulting look.  It looks haphazard even though it was planned, in that I could each set top or bottom 28 gauge loops.

Another interesting lesson from ring 2, the use of a larger number of beads results in a "crown" look when worn.

Ring 3

My final product in this series.   For this ring I made a very conscientious effort to keep the ring size small and bulk minimal.  Towards this vein I decided to wrap the 18 gauge wire only once (with only partial doubling up).  In order to anchor the base so it would stay the same size I wrapped both ends of the 18 gauge (2 times) around the single loop and then wrapped the 28 gauge wire on top.  Some modeling with a matching shade of nail polish! But I won't be keeping this ring as it will be a belated birthday present from my friend Jane P. who has always encouraged my craftiness.