Completed sterling silver pot with lid

The pictures show the first sterling round pot both with lid fitted and with the lid placed alongside, complete with my hallmarks.


The second pot, not pictured, is finished except for the making and soldering of a sterling dome to fit the collar I have made for the lid. For this second pot, I soldered the neck bezel using only the weight of an old file rather than wiring it up with binding wire as in the previous post - it worked rather better. And I was fortunate to find a cylindrical iron stake that was just the right diameter to allow me to exactly true-up both neck bezel and lid bezel.

Silver version of the bronze pots

Unfortunately I now found that the silver (only 1.5mm thick) didn't behave the same way as the bronze, even using the same silversmithing stakes. Basically, I didn't have enough height to provide both a top shoulder and a bottom shoulder, so I decided to do without the latter. The picture shows the more advanced of the two pots with a silver strip, formed into a band, just after soldering to the base, wired up with iron binding wire, and coloured variously green with flux. The second picture shows the pot after pickling and before filing to remove all trace of errant solder, along with a second sterling silver band destined to be the bezel for the lid.

16swg bronze pot continued

The first picture shows the second bronze pot with an added band of 16swg bronze to make a neck, just after soldering. The binding wires are still in place, along with dark green and blue stains from the flux. The following picture shows the same pot after pickling and a little filing to remove surplus solder.


I then made an exterior bezel from a strip of 1.2mm gauge bronze, and soldered a bronze domed lid (made from 16swg sheet) to it. The lid was decorated with planishing marks, which I intensified with the doming end of a large ball hammer.


Presently, waiting on inspiration, I have retained the inner lid; the pictures show it without and with the second (outer) lid fitted. The inner lid is slightly loose, the outer one slightly tight. I won't change this behaviour until I've decided what it's supposed to be!

Two sterling silver pots

I so liked the bronze 'acorn' pots made in an earlier post that I decided to try them or something like them in sterling silver, so I bought a sheet of 86x172x1.5mm sterling for just under £150, and sawed out two circles each of 42mm radius.
After the usual initial sinking with a doming hammer using a wooden block with a crude saucer-shaped depression, then swapping to a raising stake and a raising hammer, I got a respectable-looking egg-shaped pair of silver bowls. I flattened the bases so they would stand, then planished them at least half a dozen times, with annealing in between, to get them to the state in the photo. I retained the hammered finish by using a light burnish of the surface while I considered what to do next.

Two bronze 'acorn' pots

I raised two small (50mm high) pots from 1.6mm bronze sheet, flattened the base of each on a cylindrical stake, then incurved the top quite sharply on a narrow iron stake.


I had originally intended them to have domed lids with stalks in the manner of a large acorn. But subsequently I found that I preferred to solder a collar made from a strip of the same bronze around the top to act as a kind of bezel for a lid, which latter I made from a domed and chased disc soldered to a band formed from 1mm bronze strip. The lower picture shows one of the pots more or less finished with an etched and domed 2p piece (soldered to a bronze band below) as lid. I highlighted the design with red enamel (the resin kind, not vitreous - too unreliable and not red enough in transparent).
This lid was one of three I made as test pieces; the second is pictured in the middle (I chased a tri-spiral on a domed bronze circle), the third was a domed circle of bronze chased with bumps which I had hope would simulate the top of an acorn, but which in fact reminded me more of a jelly mould (not illustrated!)

Bronze goblet with separate hammered and filed decorative bands

The goblet was raised from a disc of 1.6mm bronze sheet. The base, originally domed, was flattened so it would stand upright and I hammer finished the rest of the surface. Then I soldered two 1mm round bronze wires round the upper portion.


The next step was to saw a light visual separation line round near the base where the tapered cylindrical section gave way to the domed base part, and finally I filed all the patination marks away from the base and from the band within the two wires. These filed areas were then sanded and polished on a buff.

After some months, I decided to make a lid, as below left and right.

Two heavy hallmarked cylindrical silver boxes B

I have now finished the two small heavy hallmarked silver boxes and sent them to their new owners. The right-hand box is in fine silver, the left-hand one in Britannia silver; both have domed lids with fine silver filigree wire decoration. In addition each box has two bands of fine silver filigree wire round the sides as in the pictures below and in an earlier post. I was forced to do without the additional decoration of coloured stones I was contemplating due to shortage of studio time.