Follow Greg whilst he creates a handmade wedding ring using Platinum with a 22ct Yellow Gold inlay.

It’s always interesting here and we love it when we get an order which means getting our hands really dirty on the bench! The creation of a inlayed and handmade wedding ring takes a lot more work than your standard band.

First, Greg makes three wax models using the lathe then smoothing out by hand using files and sandpaper. Once perfect, they get cast into metal, in this case platinum and 22ct yellow gold.

Once the wax models have been cast in the metals required, Greg preps them and either stretches or reduces the individual bands to the required finger size. He then lasers the rings to hold in place, this process is called ‘tacking’, in which gold wire is held against the join and the laser melts the solder wire into the join.

Greg then cuts a few tiny pieces of gold solder (which comes in thin sheets), using a brush he picks up the solder pieces and pops them on the warmed up (annealed) rings, onto the gaps and the solder rings and fills the gaps securing the rings together firmly. He repeats this process until all of the rings are soldered together.

Once the rings have been soldered Greg has to quench it in safety pickle to harden the metal atoms. 

The ring can now be filed into shape, it looks brutal but enough metal is left onto each casting so that there is enough metal to work with.

Once the ring is filed into shape Greg follows with a fine buff all over starting with a harsh grade going right down to a nice smooth buff to make the ring smooth enough to polish.

If you would like to call us to discuss a quote please call 0121 236 1119 or email us at mail@elementbespokejewellery.com