Linda's Magic Workshop - Linda Britt Design

 Copper Bell using Hadar's Clay  Last January I listed my goals for year 2012 as: I will have fun doing whatever I am doing. I will experiment with new techniques and share them. And I’m very pleased to say I accomplished them.   In fact, I think I will continue them for 2013! Having fun doing whatever I’m doing is pretty easy.   I’m at the age that “If it isn’t fun, why would I do it?   And if I have to do it anyway, I might as well make it fun.” Experimenting with new techniques turned out to be a mixed bag.   I experimented with polymer clay and became known as the “Button Baroness”.   (I laugh about that).   I have several mixed metal, silver metal clay and polymer pieces on consignment in two cities.   (Amazing myself).   New tools have made experimenting easier and fun.   The copper bell really tinkles!   And somewhere this year I signed up to take Hadar’s   artinsilver.com/ class in Tucson in Febru...

A couple of months ago my friend, Helen, asked me to make her a ring for her thumb out of copper.   She’s been having joint pain and thought maybe the copper against her skin would help relieve it.   Of course, I said ‘Sure’!   I came home and thought about how to make a ring that would fit or could be adjusted to fit.   And the copper really needed to touch the joint.   And Helen lives 200 miles away so there would be no ‘fitting’. I cut paper and played with a design that would wrap around the thumb and not get in the way of daily chores.   I came up with this design.   During one of my practice sessions with my jeweler’s saw, I decided how to cut it and how to decorate it.   I practiced. The copper sheet I chose for the final ring came from my junk yard treasures.   It has striations on it and the plastic protection coating was still on one side.   I carefully sawed on my scribe lines and filed and sanded all the edges. ...

My newest tools have been on the floor long enough!   The doming kit and the Swantrom Disc Cutter Set were getting dusty and I was getting anxious to try them out.   Out of the box and unwrapped! Swantrom Disc Cutter Set Remember my trip to the junk yard in a previous blog?   My friend, Kim, and I divided the scrap metal and the wire and it too was sitting on the floor.   Right!   I could hardly walk to the work bench. I had a couple of polymer clay discs ready for something and I liked the blue copper (someone’s failed etching project) from the junk yard.   So I took the disc cutter and tried it out.   After a couple of tries with the mallet, I had a disc.   Wow! It works!   And a second disc and tiny holes in each of those. I was careful to leave enough blue copper around the holes I cut so that I could use the leftover for another project I have in mind. Next the doming kit…not as easy.   In fact, I watched a Beaducatio...

Sometimes when you finish a project or in my case a piece of jewelry, you just want to show it to someone.   So I took my just finished necklace, bracelet and earrings to show my friend, Kim, at Bead-It here in Prescott.     This group of jewelry was my experiment into using sheet metals with eyelets and rivets.     She had asked earlier if I wanted to teach a class in cold connections and I agreed.   Cold connections are ways to connect individual parts and make a piece of jewelry without soldering or using a kiln.   I’ve learned many techniques at the classes I’ve taken in cold connections from some of the best teachers – Susan Lenart Kazmer and Deryn Mentock .   So I thought why not? Well, Kim was as excited about my new pieces as I was and so I will be teaching how to make this necklace.   In order to teach a class of 4 to 6 people, I need to be organized!   So I’ve started a syllabus with a list of materials needed and how much the...

Who isn’t drawn to fall leaves?   Colors changing, shapes drying, and there is a certain fragrance in the air.   As a kid, I remember jumping into a huge pile of leaves enjoying that crunching sound they made.   So when I walked along our sidewalk and looked right at a group of dried leaves hanging on the tree, I had to pick them.   They were perfectly grouped and hung together gracefully.   What a lovely necklace they would make! The stages of a leaf Studying the leaves, I noticed the variation in sizes and the variation in twists and turns.   I noticed the way they were attached to the center stem.   They sat on my desk for a couple of weeks and I would pick them up and look carefully at them trying to decide the best way to create them in copper.   Finally I made patterns of 3 sizes of leaves.   I cut them out of a copper sheet. Then I experimented with annealing (running the copper through a torch flame until the metal was cherry red a...

I love the ocean…any ocean.   I love to watch the waves roll in and out bringing seashells and ocean creatures.   The patterns of the sand can hold my attention for hours.   I love the wind on my face even when it is cold although I prefer a warm breeze.   I love old driftwood and birds at the water’s edge. I love watching whales blowing water and dolphins playing and sea otters floating on their backs. The variety of color and shapes of seashells amaze me.   Yes, I have collected many and right now they are in a pile on the guest bath counter waiting for glass shelves.   I have several small pieces of coral in various colors that were given to me by my father who also loved them.   We lived in Missouri so ocean things were always a novelty.   I keep them in a box and once in a while take them out and think about the ocean and its treasures.   The other evening I wanted to make something unusual and thought about the lovely piece of branch ...