We are busy bees in the studio making investment molds around carved wax that will be melted out and filled with recycled sterling silver and bronze... the traditional lost wax casting process. After carving our new designs, we build a wax tree with them and then, create an investment mold around that tree in an iron flask. Here is a picture of this part of the jewelery making process.
Mold making in the traditional Lost Wax Proces
Next, we will melt out the colorful wax, heat the molds overnight in a kiln and in the morning, pour liquid silver or bronze into these flasks, filling the spaces where wax used to be and creating handmade silver jewelry and artisan bronze jewelry....
Investment molds in the kiln...
After silver is poured into the flasks, it looks like this... Cooling for about an hour we keep our metals stron and happy before breaking the mold and beginning the metal clean up and finishing process.
Silver Casting Temperature: 1910 degrees F,
Bronze Casting Temperature: 1960 degrees F
xo
Crystal Hartman
Durango Colorado