Apoxie Clay and Metal Complex Bezels

This sparkly new bracelet is so easy to make that you will want to create more than one at a time!

Bezel ring blanks provide you with an endless opportunity to show off your favorite crystals.  This ring is my new favorite.

These projects were created with two new products at John Bead:  The Apoxie Sculpt Modeling Compound (available in many colours, I used Black Apoxie Clay ) and the new line of bezels called Metal Complex.  I chose the handmade oval antique brass ring for this first project.

The crystals I used were all Preciosa Pointed back Chatons and Cushion Back Chatons in various shapes. I used a Jet Navette 8×4 mm, a Pear shaped Black Diamond 8x4mm and a Crystal Chaton  .  I selected a group of my favorites and did a little sample design on my table.

The Apoxie Sculpt is a two part clay-like system.  You mix two equal amounts for two minutes until the final colour is uniform.  This “clay” now has a working time of 1-3 hours and then it air dries rock solid!

I filled the bezel ring with Apoxie Sculpt.  The left-over clay I set aside.  (I’ll show you tomorrow what I did with my leftovers.)

Then I carefully pressed all my crystals into the clay.  At this stage I added a few impressions to the clay by poking into it with a tooth pick.  All I had to do now was wait for the clay to cure for 24 hours.  Project complete!  The crystals are permanently affixed with very little work on my part.

Since I had everything out on my table I thought it would be fun to try a second bezel.

These handmade interchangeable silver plated bezels links are perfect for quick projects.  I played with these aquamarine navette crystals until my flower idea was in a design format I could reproduce in the clay.

This time I made up a small amount of the Apoxie Sculpt in Super White.  I embedded all the crystals per my design idea.  I left a few crystals hanging a bit over the edges.  I wanted the flowers to look like they were growing out of the bezel.

I could have allowed the white clay to be visible but I wanted to test another idea.  I had these tiny silver glass beads on my table and decided to see if they would adhere to the clay in the open spaces.

As you can see from the final picture the little glass beads filled in the whole background.  I also used Preciosa crystal chatons for the flower centre and on the edges.

Crystal flower jewelery in minutes!  I look forward to showing you more ideas for working with Apoxie Sculpt, Metal Complex Bezels and Preciosa crystals tomorrow.