Keeping enthusiasm for a piece

Jewelry Discussion
21 
I'm with Michael Sturlin on this one. 95% of making jewelry is
doing the repetitive, boring work. Bending the wires over and over.
Soldering the jump rings closed over and over. Setting stones over
and over. That's the way it is.

I’m with Michael & Daniel on this. However, there is a way to give
yourself a little challenge when doing repetitive jobs.

Think about the job & how you’re doing it. See if you can come up
with a faster &/or easier way of doing it. You might be surprised at
what you come up with. Even if you don’t come up with anything new,
you’ve expanded your way of thinking about a job. Sometimes it’s good
to do this for one time only jobs as well.

Half the fun of coming up with a new design is figuring out an
efficient way of making the idea come to life.

Dave

22

After reading some of the replies to this, I thought not to chime in
as others have covered the diligence, fortitude, love of process,
pride in workmanship involved in doing anything really well. I wish
to add: addiction to adrenaline, Advice: make your own.

Marianne Hunter
http://www.hunter-studios.com

23 
Make the same things over and over and over (as John D will chime
in) until you are very good at doing them.

Well, now I guess I gotta, Michael ;} All of that is very, very
true. Real jewelers are made by doing drudgery over and over -
filing, soldering, setting thousands of stones. Engraving is the
embodiment of that - practice makes perfect.

As I posted in my Steve Jobs mail, though, it’s normal to have half
finished work, jobs that weren’t what we thought to begin with, and
just plain mistakes. It’s when EVERYTHING is like that, or more than
a tiny percentage, that somebody has a bigger problem.

I do mostly work to order, so I might work on 3 or 4 jobs at once -
wax them or fabricate them all, file them all, prepolish them all,
set them all - put the big job aside to slip in a few repairs - stuff
like that. But for my own work on spec I drive myself - work on it
till it’s finished with no or minimal breaks. For those very reasons

  • I’m no less human than anybody else. Have an unfinished necklace
    that’s been put away for 10 years now…
24

Dave Arens, et al

you are so right, think ‘out of the box’ is my new logo. look at a
diamond crystal, what other ways can you sell or promote it? not
always in a ring or pendant…keep thinking, get your mind out of the
line of jewellery…its been done, try a promotion of some
sorts.THINK!!

Our gold line is so inundated with so many of the same boring
ideas…just sit back and ponder where else would you like to see
these diamond crystals? an idea might just pop up.

Your next idea might be so interesting, keep it to yourself…and
promote your idea, but again get your mind out of that preverbial
jewellery box…Gerry!

25

Thanks to all who have answered my query regarding finishing pieces.
It is just a case of perseverance in the end I guess. Someone
suggested not working on any more than three pieces at once and I
think that’s a great idea. There were other great suggestions too -
thanks.

I just need to work harder - it can’t all be fun after all - but it
still beats any other job I’ve ever had!

Thanks again.

Helen
UK
http://www.hillsgems.co.uk
http://helensgems.ganoksin.com/blogs/

26 
Sure, a piece that goes badly or is very involved may benefit from
being interleavened with other work. Sometimes it is necessary to
take a break. But it's a *process*, not just a product, and if you
don't thoroughly enjoy the process, even the challenges, then I
agree, you should look elsewhere.

For me, the joy is in finishing a piece. I can have problem after
problem and end up taking way too much time to make something, but I
have immense satisfaction in finally finishing the problem piece in
a way that is at least fairly pleasing and wearable. If it doesn’t
sell, it is at least a good learning experience.

Jan

27 
This is why I work on several--maybe 5 pieces at a time.

I’m usually in the middle of ten or so at any one time. Having to do
the repetitive stuff doesn’t preclude working on multiple items.

Daniel R. Spirer, G.G.
Daniel R. Spirer Jewelers, LLC

28

Couldn’t participate before, but it is a very serious question. If
one is uncomfortable at the bench, the good work is impossible. I am
sure who’s original posting it was, but I have the same problem. I am
not just bored, I am bored to the N’s degree. I guess it is an irony
of life that pieces that I like to work on the most are 99%
drudgery. It is really difficult to explain, but I suspect I know
what the author of the question is going through.

There are things you can do:

  1. Clean your bench at least 3 times a day. You may be a “neat freak”
    and clutter annoys you more than you realize.

  2. Develop habit of putting tools exactly where you took it from. Few
    seconds that you spend looking for tools are breaking your working
    rhythm.

  3. Divide and conquer. Break operations in tiny steps requiring no
    tool or hand position changes. For example: Let’s say you need to
    file many semi- circles. Instead of doing one complete semi-circle
    and going to the next one, you can break the work in 6 strokes. Do
    stroke one on all of the pieces, then two and so on. By doing so you
    can maintain pace that requires high degree of concentration and
    therefore precludes boredom.

  4. Your tools should be pleasant to handle. The fancy handles and
    finishes on some tools are for people like you, or should I say us.
    Tools are our jewellery. Use handle made of exotic wood, polish your
    hammers, and etc.

Make your bench the place you want to spend time.

Leonid Surpin

29

Well said Noel,

As the years passed at the bench, I realized by chance that the
design I was working on was coming together like, well, peanut
butter and jelly. My skills had developed to the point that my hands
and the materials were so comfortable together, I almost didn’t have
to consciously think about where I was in the process and what to do
next. The planning and the production had become ALMOST instinctive;
process and designing fused.

Doesn’t happen with every piece, and I certainly continue to
challenge the old cortex (it’s good for me), but it is so pleasurable
to know that, given what I want to be making, when I sit down at the
bench, I’m ready.

Linda Kaye-Moses

30 
Half the fun of coming up with a new design is figuring out an
efficient way of making the idea come to life.

I think Marianne Hunter’s post today was apt - the link to her web
site shows much labor-intensive work. Just an example. A good
example.

This is a bit of an expansion on the question. Many people aren’t
really very good at making jewelry (there, I said it…). I mean
skill, craftsmanship, efficiency, knowlege. Many times here we’ve
heard of people taking 3 hours to make a wedding band, if not 6.
Give me a handful of silver scrap and I’ll hand you a band ready to
polish in around 20 minutes, day in and day out. That is what many
people here have talked about - learning your chops, doing the
repetitive things over and over. Sitting down having to file out 250
ring blanks could be the best thing that ever happened to a great
many people.

Why? Of course it’s boring to do work when you are wasting your time
and fussing around. If you have some cluster ring with 36 prongs on
it, you are looking at 300 operations - cut wire, make space for
wire, solder bottom end, solder top end, trim, file base, contour
shape, etc - each one 36 times. One minute per operation is 300
minutes, ten seconds per operation is half an hour. When you really
know (I don’t mean when you think you know) what to do, when to do
it, and how to do it then it’s like downhillskiing - launch at the
top and 45 seconds later you’re blowing through the finish line.
That’s when the perceived druggery stops and it’s just pleasure. BTW,
I don’t ski… Part of the problem isn’t the repetition, it’s the
struggle and frustration. As has been said, we all have pieces that
just don’t make it for design reasons. I once broke a matching
earring stone, and that was it for that pair…

I went to a Faberge’ show - we had a private showing for a small
group, so we saw it all up close, and I thought, “I know how to do
everything.” That’s not to say something egotistical, it’s that each
piece is the sum of it’s parts, and there’s no great mystery to them
when you look at them that way. The egg is domed with wire borders
and hinge and catch and an applied emblem. What’s not to understand?
It also has feet… Those pieces were built by repetitive, creative
work. The engraved border has 1,643 lines on it, each done one at a
time by somebody’s hand. One minute per line is 27 1/2 hours, a
second per line is, well, call it an hour… Time for lunch, and
then on to phase 2. That’s when it’s fun.

The home cook might read a recipe: “Let… me… see… it…
says… to… put… a… teaspoon… of… anise…
now… where’s … that… teaspoon.” The pro chef goes
flip, bang, season, plate. Eat. It all comes with time.

31

Back to John Donivan’s little bit about Steve Jobs, there’s a
fascinating book that tells the whole Apple/IBM/Microsoft story.

Accidental Empires: How the Boys of Silicon Valley Make Their
Millions, Battle Foreign Competition, and Still Can’t Get a Date by
Robert X. Cringely, available from Amazon.

Nothing to do with keeping enthusiasm for a piece, but hey, we all
need a break from time to time!

Jane Walker

32

Leonid, thank you for your very good suggestions.

When we are kinder to ourselves and more considerate of our specific
ways of working, it translates to better work. And I suspect your
ideas would be beneficial to anyone working long hours, even if they
didn’t experience the feeling of drudgery we’ve been talking about.

Additionally, streamlining the process if possible and making your
workspace fit you and your needs will help to keep the focus on the
job at hand and promote being"in the flow".

More “lightbulb” ideas for making your bench the place you want to
spend time can be found in The Jeweler’s Bench Book by Charles Lewton
Brain.

http://www.ganoksin.com/item--Orchid-in-Print-Vol-2--benchbook

Pam Chott
www.songofthephoenix.com

33

I’m not bored with the process at all and don’t need to go and find
another vocation. My contribution to this forum demonstrates my
enthusiasm for making jewellery. I’m trying to analyse what exactly
makes me stop making some pieces, whilst others make it through to
the end. It is not the mundane, as I actually enjoy the mundane bits.
I enjoy sawing and filing and do it for hours. I love soldering. It’s
true that I hate the polishing stage, but that doesn’t stop me.

I guess it’s not just that a new and exciting idea comes into my
head, but that something goes wrong with the piece in hand and I’m
perhaps at a loss as to how to put it right, and there’s always
another piece waiting to progress so my attentions turn to that
instead. So perhaps I need to be more vigilant with my
trouble-shooting of problems.

I do appreciate all the advice - there have been some good tips -
but it’s not a case of simply being bored - I love making jewellery.

Helen
UK

34 
once I've started to make a piece, an idea will come into my head
for the next piece and I find that my enthusiasm for the piece in
hand dwindles to the point where sometimes, I really can't be
bothered to finish it!

helen, is the reason for that possibly because you are stumped on
what to do with your existing piece, to finish it to your
satisfaction??, could be that you decided that the design of
existing piece was not that great after all, or it isn’t turning
out like what you thought you wanted, maybe you didn’t really know
what you wanted, but got fantasy flashes of something cool, even
when you started working it, but you got stuck, and it dwindled,
possibly because of lack of enough skill>experience, that’s an issue
for sure because it limits your thinking of what can be done for a
situation, working heavy production is a great trainer, especially if
you have a good teacher, anyway, i line all my projects up or hang
them up on a separate table in my shop and living area, i have
working pieces at my other job that i constantly look at and work
on, in my car to look at and possibly work on for my commute, which
involves 1.5 hrs of sitting, so i can keep fantasizing about what
direction to go in for each issue of the unfinished pieces, it works
well, i don’t lose interest, david

35 
I once broke a matching earring stone, and that was it for that
pair........

Awhile ago I was making a pair of earrings with carved spectrolite
moon faces (crescent moon shaped, not full rounds). Got them almost
ready to go and broke the point off one of them as I was setting it.
Put it aside for a few years, then finally went to my supplier and
custom ordered a replacement stone. Got that one in, went to set it,
and guess what, broke that one too! It was apparent this pair of
earrings was never meant to be, so I took the one successful earring,
converted it to a pendant and sold it fairly soon after it went out
in the case. Had at least one of the broken ones recut and sold that
too later in something (can’t remember what). Nothing needs go to
waste.

Incidentally, I’m not big on the clean bench idea. My bench is
always a mess (I clean my drawer out once a week but the benchtop is
lucky if it sees a cleaning every few years. I get some great
inspiration from the bits and pieces that clutter it up. Melted gold,
odd bezels, clipped pieces of wire, weird castings, oddball stones.
Sooner or later everything goes into something and sometimes having
it right there in front of me is the best way for me to get a new
idea, or add to an ongoing one. But that’s just me. Everyone works
differently.

Daniel R. Spirer, G.G.
Daniel R. Spirer Jewelers, LLC

36 
now..... where's...... that...... teaspoon." The pro chef goes
flip, bang, season, plate. Eat. It all comes with time.

One more time, John D. has it covered. One small thing he left out,
but I know he knows, is that when it takes you ten seconds to do
something that used to take ten minutes, it comes out much better.
The less time spent bending a piece of wire, the fewer the marks and
wiggles in it, the better it fits, the less time it takes to finish,
the better the finished product. Faster almost always means better
when something is done by a truly skilled craftsman. And speed comes
only from repetition. This is the main difference between work done
by a master and someone that is just good. The master has just done
it a thousand times to the average person’s one hundred and gets it
exactly right first time, every time - almost without paying
attention.

If you have ever watched a master goldsmith size a ring (which
contrary to popular belief is still a part of the job), you will
notice they don’t measure anything. They don’t have to. They just
know how much to cut out or add in and exactly the shape it needs to
be to fit perfectly. It will also be exactly right on, first time,
with no pits, thinning or lumps. The only times the master will
check the size is while rounding it up after soldering and five
minutes after starting when it’s finished and going back in the job
bag, and guess what. Both times, it will be exactly right. There are
no secrets or tricks, it only comes from sizing a thousand rings. Not
from anything else.

Making jewelry as art or as a hobby is different from doing it
commercially.

You aren’t constrained so much by time, which in my mind is a
detriment to learning the necessary skills. If anyone ever wants to
be a top-shelf commercial jeweler (in other words make more than
$50,000 / year at the bench) you just have to do menial tasks over
and over and over again until you can do them in your sleep (if you
do it long enough, you will be doing it in your sleep!) The new
term for it is “muscle memory”. Yeah, it can be boring at times, but
that’s where the challenge is, isn’t it? If it was easy, everyone
would be a master goldsmith and there wouldn’t be any money in it.

The only advice I can give to someone having a block of some sort is
to set it down, walk away, do something else for a little while and
then pick it back up. Even a ten minute break from a problem piece
will more often than not give you a little different perspective and
the thing that was giving you such a hard time will just go together.

Human beings learn things in spurts and plateaus and in the plateaus
sometimes we end up going backwards for a little while. There isn’t a
master of anything ever born that hasn’t dealt with this. This is a
major reason why masters become masters - they don’t give up when
they hit that wall. Helen, I’d be willing to bet you’ve just hit a
plateau. When you hit a plateau, you just have to work through it. It
might take a week or it might take a year. Eventually, you’ll get
through it and find your self spurting along again.

Just keep on plugging away at it.
Dave

37 
could be that you decided that the design of existing piece was not
that great after all,,, or it isn't turning out like what you
thought you wanted,,, maybe you didn't really know what you wanted,
but got fantasy flashes of something cool, even when you started
working it, but you got stuck, and it dwindled,, possibly because
of lack of enough skill experience,

I think you’re the first person to truly analyse my problem
correctly, and that it’s not to do with boredom.

i line all my projects up or hang them up on a separate table in my
shop and living area, i have working pieces at my other job that i
constantly look at and work on,

I too have taken to leaving such pieces out on my bench top so that
I can still see them while I’m working on something else. That way,
their predicament is constantly entering my brain, causing me to
have to think about them in some way. Hopefully, this way, I’ll be
able to pick up such pieces and continue to work on them to
completion.

Thanks for understanding.

Helen
UK

38

Hi Dave,

If anyone ever wants to be a top-shelf commercial jeweler (in other
words make more than $50,000 / year at the bench) you just have to
do menial tasks over and over and over again until you can do them
in your sleep

As I’ve already explained, I do actually enjoy doing the repetitive
stuff, strangely enough. Probably because I don’t have to think
about it - you can just do it and get better and quicker at it. I’d
love a job doing menial benchwork for a store but that’s not going to
happen as I am at home due to ill health. So I need to get that self-
discipline sorted out somehow by myself.

I'd be willing to bet you've just hit a plateau. When you hit a
plateau, you just have to work through it. It might take a week or
it might take a year. Eventually, you'll get through it and find
your self spurting along again.

To be honest, I don’t think it is a plateau. I think it’s overload.
Granted I’m not making money out of my jewellery-making yet - not
because it’s not salable, because it is, and I do get commissions -
but because I’ve not had the time to actively pursue selling it yet.
So I’m still at the stage where most of what I’m making, happens to
be freebies for friends and family and myself, peppered with the odd
commission. My head is bursting with things I want to try but I don’t
get time to do them. It’s not a mental block - it’s the opposite.
I’ve explained to a few people recently, that due to my illness, I
have to make lists of things to be done, otherwise I simply forget to
do them. So at the moment, on my list of “things to make” aRe: a
commissioned piece for my husband’s work colleague, a men’s bracelet
for my daughter’s friend, cufflinks for my daughter’s lecturer, a
ring for another of her teachers, cufflinks for someone else, a
necklace for a friend, a birthday present for my daughter,
commissioned earrings for my sister, etc, etc. The list goes on - I
can’t remember them all. Oh yes, I forgot, on top of all this, my
daughter-in-law’s first baby was due the Saturday just gone so I
want to make her something with tanzanite.

So as well as the flashes of inspiration I get of pieces I want to
make, I have this list of things which must be made and it’s all got
on top of me I think. I’ll be working on a piece and then suddenly
remember I’ve got a deadline looming for another piece, so that one
takes priority. I guess I just need to get more organised - simple
as that.

I do enjoy it immensely, but I think I’d enjoy it much more and
obviously be more productive if I actually get some sort of system
going. That way, I might eventually get the time to produce a body
of work to sell too!

Thanks for all the advice.

Helen
UK

39

Daniel,

Incidentally, I'm not big on the clean bench idea. My bench is
always a mess (I clean my drawer out once a week but the benchtop
is lucky if it sees a cleaning every few years.

Very good to hear about your bench cleaning, it’s been so long for
mine that I have forgotten the technique. Drawer gets it when
switching to high value materials, usually really deep in wax and
silver and who knows what else. And always a gawd awful shock to
realize that I once painted it white :slight_smile:

jeffD
Demand Designs
Analog/Digital Modelling & Goldsmithing
http://www.gmavt.net/~jdemand

40 
but that something goes wrong with the piece in hand and I'm
perhaps at a loss as to how to put it right, and there's always
another piece waiting to progress

Helen, for all the round-and-round on this thread trying to analayze
it, I think the most important thing for you in particular to
understand has been said, by me, for one. Welcome to the club!!! Not
everything works - “Sometimes a Great Notion” and all that. I have a
dismal failure downstairs that I made decades ago - I won’t describe
it, it’s an embarrrassment… It’s part of the process… As one
grows as a metal/gold smith, the bench skills sharpen, but also the
ability to make fewer failures or at least better work consistently.
Design, yes, but more that design that is how something is filed, how
the curves are all just so, the proportion is right on - stuff like
that.

It’s like dancing, for those who dance - nobody laughs at the
first-timers on the dance floor, because we all remember when that
was us…You are not alone…