I had an old family friend come by today to buy another bracelet for her daughter. She was originally a friend of one of our younger sisters and has a collection of “Meixner Bracelets” from the mid 70s to the mid 90s. At my suggestion, she brought all of her bracelets so that I could polish and photograph them. Attached is a picture of her bracelets. Her collection is typical of hundreds of people in Central NY and beyond who have bought our father’s, mine or my brother’s bracelets over the years…Rob
With the exception of the smaller brass and silver bracelet, these bracelets were all made by our father who was right handed. I typically twist in a clockwise direction unless there is some design reason not to…Rob
I am curious - these are being referred to as bracelets.
I have always called these bangles.
My understanding is that bracelets are flexible chain style worn around the wrist.
Happy to be corrected!
We call them bracelets, short for cuff bracelets. A bangle is a complete solid circle. We make them too. A chain bracelet is a chain bracelet. My wife can no longer comfortably wear a cuff as she has a condition that causes her to bruise easily. I am slowly turning her collection of gold bracelets into chain style bracelets, earrings and other pieces of jewelry that she can give to our daughters in law and grand daughters. I know that these terms will vary from one region of the world to another. In Central NY they are called bracelets and we have been making them for over eighty years…Rob
Another friend came by with a collection of Meixner Bracelets. She wanted to add one more to celebrate their 50th (Golden) Anniversary. I also made their wedding rings. She wanted it to be all gold until I convinced her that it would cost a small fortune to do that, so she settled on one with a small twist of 14 KY inside a heavier silver bracelet. Following is a picture of her collection. Many were made by our Dad years ago with several by me and one by Don…Rob
Rob,
Really nice, elegant collection of bracelets! Y’all can be very proud of continuing a 50+ year tradition. Fun to sit here thinking about how they were each made! A novice question, though. Is the twisted wire all held together by the twists and (on some) the flattening, or were any soldered together anywhere but on the ends? -royjohn
royjohn…Thanks for your kind words. There is very little soldering. They start out as a straight piece of 8 or 10 gauge round or square wire. The ends are soldered together and the circle is flattened with the ends usually being pounded tight. They are then twisted. I go clockwise, others may go counter clockwise. A simple bracelet just gets twisted tight and then forged flat, triangular, half round or left round depending on the final design. If smaller twisted elements are added, it is done after a couple of twists. They are only soldered into the ends of the heavier twist so that everything twists evenly. Among Dad, Don and myself we have made thousands of these bracelets. They were originally done with 8 gauge when silver was $2.50/ounce. As silver got more expensive, we started doing some in 10 gauge. Our twisted bracelets are a bit unique in that the ends are rounded and not just cut from a longer piece of twisted stock. This takes a lot of planning and experience to know how big a piece of wire to start with to get a specific size when you are done. Who knows what we will be doing if silver hits $50/ounce like some are predicting. This did happen for a short period of time during the mid 70s when the Hunt Brothers went on their rampage. Thanks for asking…Rob
