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Reign Jewelry and Lapidary is based out of Los Santos and is a subsidiary of Cruorem Enterprises, both owned and run by myself.

 

While I focused my career on emergency surgery, I also have other hobbies. I love learning about jewelry, art, and history, What started as a few fun college courses in jewelry ended up in a full degree.

 

I also learned the art of gem cutting, called lapidary. While I don't mind using pre-cut stones, I do find cutting them myself to be extremely relaxing. It also allows for a greater range of jewelry to be created. 

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Making the piece either by hand or using premade settings, every item of jewelry from Reign is created using care, precision, and passion. Pieces focus on being stylish, elegant, and suited to everyday wear and tear. By purchasing from Reign, you will always end up with an item created with the utmost dedication at the highest possible quality.

-Adrasteia Cruorem 

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Fusing The Past and The Present,

Some Jewelry Methods and Facts From Reign. 

 

I'm sharing one of my favorite historical forms of stone cutting, intaglio. Gems that were popular in ancient Rome and the surrounding areas as basic jewelry, amulets, and talismans. These pieces required extraordinary skill and remarkable craftsmanship. 

 Photos below are examples of intaglio from the MET Museum, The British Museum, and other sources. 

 

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Many methods and designs of making jewelry from antiquity still are used today.

This fine silver necklace I made by hand on the left, is the same kind of chain as two out of three seen at The British Museum on the right.

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Called a Loop-In-Loop, the name is a simple reference to how the chain is created. Each individual link is hand-wound, cut, and soldered together. Using fine silver is easier, as it has the solder already within the metal, and as long as the link is properly formed, when the correct heat is applied and quickly removed, the ring itself with melt for a second, fusing itself together into a solid ring. 

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That circular ring is then stretched with pliers and bent into a 'c' shape and bent together. A chain tool, which looks like a very small spike, is inserted straight through both ends, then repeated from the other side to ensure the piece is even. This opens the ends into the circles you see below. The pattern is continued by taking the next bent ring, putting it through the holes just made, and repeating.

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The inner necklace is made using the same technique, the link used is much longer, folded over, then the ends opened up, and one twisted. the next link is put through, folded, then repeated.

 

These types of necklaces can only be made by hand. It is impossible to replicate with a machine. If a link breaks in the chain, you have to remove that length of the chain and start again at the break. A necklace like this can take up to a week of constant work to create from start to finish. 

 

The same Loop-In-Loop design can be turned into multiple variations. This one has one end hammered out after being opened, and is called a 'Sailors Knot Chain'. 

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I love learning how items have traveled across the world and transitioned throughout history. Items are introduced via trade and become something new and inspiring to the people who first see it. Typically new cultures then take the item, keeping aspects that they like, and changing others to match their own beliefs, interests, and techniques. 

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We alter, fuse, and blend traditions into our own identifiable concepts and items, but we still can have something that has rarely changed. We may have newer techniques, tools, and different ways of making these chains popular, but at its base, this is still a chain from antiquity that is made today. I think that in itself is pretty remarkable. 

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