Sunday, June 2, 2013

History And Art Fused In Silver Coin Rings

By Michelle Howe


Silver coin rings are a pleasure to wear, and a very welcome gift. They are available in more and more variety these days, and combine art and history wonderfully well. These tiny bits of metal have so much to tell, as they have likely travelled all over the nation, been handled and possessed by thousands and thousands of people and so on. Wearing them on your finger is like wearing something that is artistic and historically significant at the same time.

These days, the alloy used in mints is not the same as it used to be. Instead of using a lot of silver, less expensive metals are used now, which tend to oxidize with time and can leave marks on the fingers of the wearer of jewelery made out of them. However, pieces such as the Walking Liberty Half Dollar, the Franklin Half Dollar, the Kennedy Half Dollar, Washington Quarter Dollar or the Barber Half Dollar, which were cast before the change in composition was made, work very well for this kind of jewelery.

As these half dollars and quarter dollars were all minted to be of different sizes, it is possible to purchase silver coin rings made out of them in different sizes. For both men and women, be they slight or otherwise, a beautiful piece of jewelery can surely be made by a number of talented craftsmen who operate in different parts of the country.

Most such jewelery that was made some time ago, or can be made by you at home, has sides that are smooth and devoid of any engravings. This is because the traditional method of making such jewelery involved repeatedly striking the sides of the coin till it wore down to the diameter required, and then getting rid of the middle part. This results in a piece of jewelery that is smooth metal on the insides and outside.

Now, though, newer techniques have been developed which leave the beautiful engravings intact and you can proudly wear and admire these. This also means that the jewelery is so much more interesting than before. You can have a look at some examples by running a search online.

If you badly want such jewelery, but do not know where to obtain the raw material required for its making, you can be at ease. Most artists who work with such jewelery have their own stash of dollars that you can choose from and have incorporated into your accessory. It is a good idea to pick dollars that were made in a year in which someone was born or was married, have these made into jewelery, and gift it to them.

Of course, if you have a specific piece in mind that you want to be used for the jewelery, most artists will oblige and use the same. Some ideas are coins that were minted in a certain year, in small quantities or are what you consider to be lucky.

To find makers of such jewelery in your region, you can simply look online and then visit them in person to talk about your new jewelery. A number of sellers also ship silver coin rings that you place an order for right to your home.




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