a few years ago, i used to do benchwork. i never quite learned how to set a stone, but i sure knew how to lose baguettes...pain in the butt and overrated.
loved working with silver. easy on the mandrel to size. a few quick taps and there you were, at 7 or 10.
i cooked a few opals, crappy stones. onyx, more crap. i'd have to dye the glue black to glue those flat and tacky onyx pieces on mens rings. all those department store pieces??? junk. most are reworked by shops like the one i worked in. they're repaired, stamped, polished and wah-la, almost good as new...
emeralds, rubies, (from the same family and easy to cook too) actually the best ones have inclusions. the clean ones are either synthetic or cost enough to fund a student through grad school. the shop manager, an expert in pave settings, once built a ring around a 10k emerald. it was gorgeous.
sad part of the job? filling the engravings on wedding bands, especially if the date of the inscription was 6 months ago...sad, all sad.
funny? you could always tell the repo rings...they came in mangled.
;-)
we never threw anything in the garbage. it got swept up and put in the metal bins...'cause there was gold dust everywhere...
good part of the job? deciding that platinum is gorgeous.
and princess cut was my favorite.
they said i had good hands
had big plans for me...
but
i'd rather be hitting a vein.
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