Our Signature Cane

For some time now we've been experimenting with a way of "signing" our work.  We now have several methods of doing so, depending on the individual piece.  For instance, some of our necklaces fasten with a lobster claw and a chain extender to add a little extra length if desired. The beads shown above are a few of the ones that were custom designed to match the individual necklace.  When you flip the bead over, you will see our signature:

This was made by creating a "signature" cane.  I tried capturing a few photos to give you an idea of how it was made.  I started by forming the letters.

I then filled all around and in between the letters with clay, packing it as tight as possible.

Then the more difficult part is reducing the cane to a smaller size.  Some of the outside design was lost in the reducing stage.  I discovered that if I wanted to maintain that detail I should've wrapped more clay around the outside before reducing.  Anyhow, this one didn't turn out too bad for our first try -- I'm sure the next one will come out much better.

Now we have a lot of cane slices to put onto our signature beads as well as other pieces like this brooch shown below:

I'll show in a later post another technique on how we made our "signature stamp".