About Author: Chirssy Fan, the OEM manager, who has been working in professional silver jewelry wholesaler and manufacturer Silverbene for 5 years, who has been devoted in the silver jewelry industry for more than 7 years. I spent 5 years living in China jewelry center – Panyu and kept learning different workmanship in different factories. Now I will introduce my favorite workmanship: enamel. Welcome to contact me or our website
Hi dear jewelers. I believe that all of you have heard or tried enamel jewelry products. In this article, I would like to share more knowledge about enamel jewelry with you, on the basis of experience working in a Chinese jewelry factory – Silverbene. But as I’m Chinese, my translation might be wrong or some of the nouns might be strange. If you feel confused, welcome to comminute with me. No more crap, here we go!
General introduction：Enamel, also called vitreous enamel and porcelain enamel, is a composite handicraft formed by fusing the glass enamel powder on the surface of the substrate (such as metal, glass or ceramics), most of which are colored utensils.
Principle and characteristics：In China, the ancient enamel ware and the enamel watch imported from Europe at that time have gone through hundreds of years, and now they are still as bright and beautiful as new! It can be said that Enamel Jewelry in the jewelry family is the strongest artistic expression. Enamel Jewelry is made of gold, silver, copper and other metals, ceramics and glass. It is made by drawing or filling enamel pigment on the fetal bone, and then sintered in a high temperature furnace at 800 ℃ for many times. Enamel color pigment is a kind of glaze made of quartz, feldspar, oxidized metal and other minerals. It is made by grinding. After continuous color painting on the tire blank and then repeatedly sintering in the kiln, a beautiful enamel work of art is finally produced. Enamel is very colorful, with a gem like luster and texture, corrosion-resistant, wear-resistant, high temperature resistant, waterproof and moisture-proof, hard and solid, not aging and deterioration, after thousands of years, it will not fade or lose light. Shape, color and light are all good, just like wearing a fine miniature painting with you, and it will never fade, and will last forever! It is both practical and value preserving. Worthy of being a wonderful flower in jewelry! It is also very suitable for the color matching of fashion clothing.
Workmanship Types Of Enamel Jewelry
1.Cloisonne Enamel. Cloisonne enamelis a kind of utensil made of soft flat copper wire on the copper mold, which is pinched into various patterns and welded, and then filled with enamel color glaze and fired in the patterns.
2. Transparent Enamel. Transparent enamel uses colorless or color transparent glaze for decoration, through which bright patterns can be seen faintly, forming a unique artistic decoration effect. The manufacturing method is to carve various hollow patterns on the metal blank, pad mica or copper sheet, fill in the enamel and burn until it is completely filled, remove the gasket, and then grind and polish to make the cavity show bright enamel.
3. Painted Enamel. Painted enamel originated in Western Europe and France. It was introduced into China by merchants and missionaries in the 16th century. Unlike the filigree enamel, the metal wire which does not outline the outline of the painting is more like a delicate oil painting. Due to the difficulty of the process, it has not been widely used
4. Cold Enamel. Cold enamel technology (also known as drop glue or imitation enamel) is a process in which the resin replaces the traditional glaze to fill the handicraft, and the visual effect of high-temperature enamel can be formed after the resin solidifies. Cold enamel has the advantages of low cost, simple manufacture and high yield, but the resin materials used are not durable, corrosion-resistant, wear-resistant, high temperature resistant, easy to aging, fade and lose luster.
The above is the application of enamel in jewelry, although painting enamel is not widely used because of the difficulty. The picture on the right is the enamel jewelry that won the first prize of the professional group in the 2019 Shanghai Xinrui Jewelry Design Competition. The design selects the architectural works of Frank Gehry as the design inspiration, applies the characteristics of Frank Gehry’s architectural works to jewelry design, and presents the architectural characteristics with jewelry as the carrier. The overall shape of the work reflects the characteristics of the building with liquidity and strong tension. Enamel is used to present the texture and color of the building surface.
Thank you for reading. As a manufacturer specializing in silver ornaments, Silverbene sincerely invites you to cooperate and win-win if your company intends or has developed enamel products.