My brother and our late father are both engineers. It suits them- they are both adept at problem-solving and looking at how things are put together to devise innovative solutions. My dad was a bookworm, and he built dozens of sturdy, utilitarian bookshelves around the house. He used his engineering knowledge to determine the optimum material, placement, and support infrastructure for sturdy shelves (that could handle mischievous kids climbing on them!). My brother took after him, but he has a knack for putting together electronic solutions, whether for home security, data management, or other strategies. So when they’d fix stuff, they weren’t just a duct tape and pray operation, but they thought in terms of practical structure, and they weren't afraid to think outside the box about big picture problem-solving.
I’m a wildlife biologist, so I think in systems and my knowledge of physics capped out at two semesters in college. But being a biologist, I think in systems, and about the symphony of little details. And that’s served me well in jewelry design, as I consider many moving parts.
Many times, I’ve been in conversations with people, whether through chats on Instagram, or introductions when I pull out my phone to show jewelry I’ve made, and I get the, “Whoa- those are beautiful! So intricate! I’ve never seen anything like that!”
As time has gone on, I’ve realized that jewelry design requires a lot more than just aesthetic design. Some of my jewelry pieces end up being interesting feats of engineering, and requires a little knowledge of physics and geometry- I realize I need to tinker with the number of beads to ensure that thread tension is at the sweet spot (too loose and you get this weird ballooning, too tight and the piece folds over on itself). Or maybe I need to consider a particular bead shape or weight, or even change thread types to be more rigid or more flexible to get a piece to sit properly.
I came to realize that my jewelry design was tantamount to engineering when I made the Stonecrossing Bracelet. I had sketched out a chicken scratch sketch, and my original vision was that the zig zag lines on either end would be it, so it’d add some fun dimension to the wrist. But physics intervened- thread tension and gravity meant that the bracelet would end up with a weird, flared out spiky design. Womp womp.
But I didn’t despair- I realized if I added a strand of beads on either side, then a structured lattice design results! Hooray! So the end result is this nifty bracelet with a distinctive design. And the cool part is that this bracelet is a system with a lot of interconnected parts, much like ecosystems or urban infrastructure. So the central focal stones serve as load-bearing support beams, and the zig zag beads serve as struts to create the distinctive structure.
Another case where engineering came into play was designing fringed necklaces. Early on, I thought it’d be pretty simple- just cascading strands. Alas, physics interfered and made a simple fringe necklace into chaotic spaghetti. I mulled it over- ah- I need some support structure for the fringes to cascade just right! I used these double-drilled gemstones as support, paired with sturdy beadwork in a collar that serves as a support beam to hang the fringes from. Success! I first noticed this with the Adriatic Splendor necklace- I had seen some exquisite cascading necklaces from Bosnia, and noticed that the fringe had a support structure, and draped beautifully. I considered how I might make a support structure with stones and beads, and I came up with one that sat properly on the neck. And hanging fringes from there allowed the necklace to come together cohesively.
I made the Merv necklace this past winter, and it made me a little batty- my original vision was just chaotic spaghetti, so I tried changing proportions of different beads- same story. Blergh! So I revisited the support beam structure from the Adriatic splendor and constructed that- success! Do you see the similarities?
When I came to think of jewelry design as tantamount to engineering, and governed by physics and geometry, it made design seem a lot less like a shot in the dark. I’d make a crude sketch, but to reduce the amount of trial and error, I’d consider the engineering behind the design- how might I make that work? Or is the design process going to take me in a whole new direction, like it did with the Gandhara necklace? This was one where I had a crude sketch, and when I revisited it with an engineer’s eye, “Hey- wait a minute- this is how we can make the drape look polished!” And I tried some different bead shapes.
It’s an interesting process, and from sketch to physical piece, I might need to contemplate the engineering for a little bit to get it to drape properly. By using engineering, I get pieces that go from, “Eh….” To, “Ah ha!” I love looking at the world, and letting that percolate into chicken scratch sketches, and using a bit of engineering mindset to come up with a piece that works!