Sometimes I'll pierce something in the back of a closed back setting to reveal the back of the stone in an artistic way
I fail to see how this could do anything other than enhance the
setting. But I would go further and say that a pierced back of the
bezel cup would only be really effective if the stone was very
translucent. Thus light could shine through the piercing and the
pattern would come up as a rather pleasant if ghostly ‘picture’ on
the face of the stone. However, this would only work if the pierced
pattern were simple - say like a cross; a star, an initial, etc. So
the cabochon should be of a reasonable size and the back of the stone
as polished as the front. I have used particularly translucent fine
green jade for this purpose with the back of the bezel cup no thicker
than 1 millimetre; I prefer 0.5mm. Any thicker than 1mm and it looks
ugly.
Off the subject; One or two kind people have voiced concern in that
they noticed I haven’t contributed much lately, and have wondered
about my welfare, and I thank them for their caring. In fact, I am
alive and as well as might be expected at my age (nothing wrong that
50 years wouldn’t cure) and living a quiet happy life in the village
of Mapua. I have been working with jewellery for about 28 years,
but at nearly 81 find I am no longer quite so interested, though I
still eagerly absorb my daily ‘fix’ of Orchid. One of the reasons is
that many of the questions have been answered so many times in the
past that I now leave them to others. But if there is anything to
which I feel I can usefully contribute, I will do so. – Cheers for
now,
John Burgess; @John_Burgess2 of Mapua, Nelson NZ