Necklace,
I made this and another silver and turquoise floral necklace at the same time. I will post the other one soon.
With this necklace I was attempting to see if I could twist the spiculum forms together and make a simpler necklace that still had the detail I love.
I used turquoise which my grandfather had purchased in the 1950’s. It is Morenci turquoise from Arizona. The special thing about this turquoise is that it is calibrated and to cut calibrated Morenci would necesitate a huge quantity of the material. Morenci has the unfortunate desire to split along matrix like the quartz often found in it and usually splits just before you are finished cutting. So I can’t imagine the mountain of material that the cutter must have had to get any quanitity of calibrated stones. My grandfather used much of this material during his life time and so did my father. I originally sold this Morenci lot to a man I met at the Tucson Gem Show. John Joyce is the man’s name and John held onto it for the past 3 years when I asked him if he had any turquoise. He said he still had all the stone I had sold him and I bought it all back from him. This is sort of the way turquoise gets around. At the time I sold it to him I had no use for calibrated then suddenly I did want calibrated for this type of cluster work.
I don’t expect to ever see calibrated Morenci again. I see lots of Sleeping Beauty that is calibrated because of the hardening treatment it recieves, it is easy to cut. I love that Sleeping Beauty myself but nothing compares to the feel of this Morenci.
This piece is available through www.bahti.com or www.southwesternjewelry.net
I don’t presently have a website that I like, I’m working on it. If you would like more information about me or my family’s work you can Google “Sam Patania” or “Patania” and you will see several articles written about us. I can be reached at my studio in Tucson by calling 520-795-0086, I am by appointment only.
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