Congratulations, Dan and Heather!

Holy cow! My sister is engaged! Hooray!

A few months ago, my brother-in-law-to-be, Dan, wrote me to ask if I could keep a secret and to see if I'd be willing/able to make the engagement ring he wanted to give to my sister. After being sworn to secrecy and promised that he would deny my existence if my cover was blown, we got to work.

We started with pictures of the jewelry she usually wears being sent to me so that I could start the design process. Once I had those on hand, I sent Dan a page with something like 15 different potential designs sketched out. We settled on a favorite, and then the real fun began.

You see, Dan is a very smart, well-educated doctor/chef/pianist who knows NOTHING about the world of jewelry. Here's what Dan told me at the beginning: "I really have very little knowledge about this kind of thin. I've never really bought jewelry for anyone, other than some earrings from Uganda for HB [my sister] that cost like $7.50."
I knew it was going to be fun.

We discussed metals - vetoing silver, yellow gold, and platinum for being too cheap, something she wouldn't wear, and too expensive, respectively - and spent a lot of time talking about stones.


We knew she wouldn't want a white diamond, but weren't quite sure where to go from there. We decided to try to find a colored diamond, which was proving to be quite problematic. I don't know if you've ever tried to find a stone, but I've decided it's much better to find beautiful stones and design around them rather than trying to find the exact stone that fits your design and artistic vision. Luckily for us, Dan overheard the HB talking to a friend about how much she HATES diamonds, so we decided to take a different route.

Here's my favorite exchange:
Me - I have always thought of her as a red. Rubies are worse than diamonds in terms of conflict and bloodshed, so maybe a garnet? What do you think?

Dan - Sweet - a Kevin Garnet? Seriously, I have no idea what a garnet is.

We ended up going with a classic, blue sapphire, because sapphire is her birthstone and because they're just really, really pretty. I found The Natural Sapphire Company which sells only conflict-free stones mined in an environmentally sustainable way. Perfect! I found a gorgeous, square, cushion-cut stone, and another fancy-cut stone that they sent to me to compare. We decided on the cushion-cut to be bezel-set in a palladium white gold shank. (Some of these terms I learned as a part of the process.)

Anyhow, I'm getting a bit long-winded, but it was amazing to be able to be a part of this process and to get to make this for Heather. I ordered 3mm half-round wire only to find that I really wanted 2mm wire, and Margaret, my incredible teacher, helped me draw it down to the correct width. We used the excess wire to make the setting for the stone by running it through a rolling mill and various other things to alter the shape and thickness.

I made a mock-up of the setting in silver, and then drove to Boston (where there were better tools) a week and a half later to make the real thing. The pictures in this post are all from that day.

Everything ran smoothly until we tried to set the stone.

You see, palladium white gold is a much stronger alloy than nickel white, which makes it a lot more durable, but also a lot less malleable. During our first setting attempt, the bezel ripped off the band, leading to a quick design alteration and a repair. Setting attempt number two was also unsuccessful as the mandrel was just not steady enough to use as a base for the ring. In the end, we had to wrap the whole ring in clear band-aids and sink all but the bezel in a bowl full of tar.

No, I'm not kidding. I can't say I my confidence was very high at that point.

But Margaret knows what she's doing, and with her guidance and ample assistance, We were able to complete the ring in time for me to send it to Dan before he and the HB headed off on their cross-country move from Albuquerque, to Portland, OR.

So, on Friday, June 27, at Russell's Truck Stop outside Springer, NM, Dan popped the question and Heather said yes!

No, I'm not kidding about the truck stop, either.

And here it is:


It's too small for Heather right now, but that won't be hard for her to have fixed, and I couldn't be happier for the two of them!

-M