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Wire weaving

Jewelry Discussion
#1

I took a class in wire weaving an what we did was the low tech
method, wrap some masking tape around the bottom of your warp (or
the base) ans weave over the open end. We even made tubes by
wrapping the bottom and them curling them to form a tube, just
weave around them. Check out the work of Mary Lu Hu, and the
recently revised, “Textile Techniques In Metal” by Arlene Fisch.

Nicolette
Nicolette Hiott @Nicolette_D_Hiott
http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/7212

“Blessed are those who laugh at themselves, for they shall never
cease to be amused. -Anonymous”

#2

I took a class in wire weaving an what we did was the low tech
method, wrap some masking tape around the bottom of your warp (or
the base) ans weave over the open end. We even made tubes by
wrapping the bottom and them curling them to form a tube, just
weave around them. Check out the work of Mary Lu Hu, and the
recently revised, “Textile Techniques In Metal” by Arlene Fisch.

Nicolette
Nicolette Hiott @Nicolette_D_Hiott

“Blessed are those who laugh at themselves, for they shall never
cease to be amused. -Anonymous”

#3

Tiffany & Co. sells a ring of woven wiRe:

http://www.tiffany.com/images/products/zoom_images/16429996_xl.jpg

On the inside of the ring is a small, flat disk engraved with
"T&Co." and a karat mark.

Being a weaver, I am curious as to how this was constructed. I can
see that the weft is one wire, with its two ends soldered together
and hidden under the disk, but I can’t figure out how they managed
to hide all the warp end(s) and still get the weave so tight! Any
ideas?

Janet

#4 
Being a weaver, I am curious as to how this was constructed. I can
see that the weft is one wire, with its two ends soldered together
and hidden under the disk, but I can't figure out how they managed
to hide all the warp end(s) and still get the weave so tight! Any
ideas?

Question: Is this ring rigid? It almost looks like interlocking
coils (twirl the coil through another coil like you would twirl it a
coil through the holes of a spiral bound book) that are alternately
ofsett and soldered to one another at the ends with no warp involved.
The coil that closes the ring is twirled through the two coils at
the ends of the bent around strip of coils. Then final coil’s ends
are soldered in place. The inside diameter of the coils wouldn’t be
much more than twice the thickness of the wire and the spread between
each revolution of the coil would be about the thickness of the
wire. Does this make sense?

Donna Shimazu

#5 
        Tiffany & Co. sells a ring of woven wire:
http://www.tiffany.com/images/products/zoom_images/16429996_xl.jpg

I’m no expert but if I’m not mistaken that design is a slightly
flattened version of the Mesh Chain, Project 16 in Alan Revere’s
"Professional Goldsmithing", p.121 It’s simply a number of
interlocking wire coils. In the Tiffany piece it appears they may
have used oval coils instead of round. In Alan’s case the ends of the
wire coils are finished with sweat soldered disks whereas in the
Tiffany piece it appears as if they’ve simply turned the coil ends in
a bit. It’s hard to tell for sure from the photo but it sure looks to
me as if you can see the ends of the wire coils along the sides of
the weave.

Cheers,
Trevor F.

#6

Regarding the Tiffany “woven” wire ring. I do not know the names of
this particular link system (and do not have my copy of Alan’s book
here at home), but there are two similar looking ways of making a
mesh system like this. I believe this one uses short sections of
coils that have been pulled apart (or made) just enough to be able to
push the coils of another length between them. Once pushed together,
one can slip a straight rod down through where they overlap so that
they cannot be pulled apart again. I hope this makes sense to you.
I can see both the ends of the coils plus the ends of the straight
wire between them on the edges. This would create a band flexible in
one direction - one could “flatten” it to an oval.

The other system is more similar to the system in chain link fence,
and to what has already been described, where one coil can be
"spiraled" into the previous, etc. Here, one would see the ends of
each coil, but no additional ends. This material can be machine
made (and hand made) in large sheets from many wires in a type of
braid that Jack Lenor Larsen in his textile books refers to as
Neolithic Braid, and cut to form all sorts of jewelry items. This
can also be flexible in the long direction only - (around the ring) -
but usually not quite so. Both are often used in watch bands.

Mary Hu
Seattle
@Mary_Hu

#7 
    It almost looks like interlocking coils (twirl the coil through
another coil like you would twirl it a coil through the holes of a
spiral bound book) Donna Shimazu

Hi Donna; I think you are right on the money with that hypothesis. I
posted another theory, which would give you something very similar,
but upon reading your post, I looked at the picture again and think
you have the correct identification of the technique used. It also
appears to have been flattened somewhat. That’s tricky to do without
collapsing the coils. We used to heat the assembly, then burn it
slightly into a pair of hardwood blocks. By clamping it between the
blocks, we could flatten the coils oval without them folding over
sideways.

David L. Huffman

#8

Perhaps this ring is not woven at all. It seems to me that it is
constructed of spirals that are screwed into one another and then
flattened slightly. Hence there would be no true weft or warp. I may
have to try this. – M’lou Brubaker, Jeweler Goodland, MN
www.craftswomen.com

#9

Donna:

This ring is made of woven wire mesh. Commonly known as Milanese
mesh. It is made from a series of spiral wires. Wire is twisted
into loose three foot spirals similar to a note book wire, but, very
accurately coiled. One spiral wire is then threaded or screwed into
two opposite coils, one on each side of the one being screwed in and
on and on to form a belt of this woven material that can be as much
as three feet wide and as long as one hundred feet. Infinitely
longer lengths can be made, but they would be unwieldy. It is then
slit into narrow widths, (with of ring desired ) this slitting
secures the loose wire ends and then this narrow with is cut into
whatever lengths are needed for different size rings. This short
length is then formed into a round ring and joined at the joint by
screwing in a short length of the same coiled wire used to make the
original belt of mesh. It is then flattened in a rolling operation
secured on the inside using a roller to avoid collapsing the ring and
a flat roller on the outside to lock the coils in place. If you
wanted it domed you would use a pair of matching rollers to form that
shape.

We make silver , gold and brass beads using the same material formed
into tubes with a seam down the length of the tube. Once the bead is
formed the seam is hardly visible. The wire they use for my bead
material is 23 gage, but, I think they use about 20 gage for the ring
material.

This mesh is produced in North Attleboro Massachusetts by a well
managed old line company first class jewelry craftsmen. I don’t know
how old the process is, but it is an old technique and labor
intensive. You can purchase chain machines that make it, but none
compare even remotely to the quality produced by this company.

Ron Pratt