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Many people wonder how the various exquisite items of jewellery come to be, and who actually makes them. Starting with the second part of the question, we would discover that the various exquisite items of jewellery we so much admire tend to be made by jewellery designers, these being individuals with backgrounds in the visual artists who have specialized in the art of making great-looking jewellery, so that in the final analysis, the jewellery design becomes a form of artistic expression. And turning to the second part of the question, as to how the jewellery designers do it, it turns out that they are able to come up with the beautiful works of art through the use of certain established principles of jewellery design.
Now while different schools of thought in the jewellery design fraternity have different views with regard to what the principles of jewellery design actually are, it is generally agreed that for a jewellery designer to come up with a truly appreciable piece of work, he or she has to keenly pay attention to the composition of the item, the ‘movement’ in the item, the ‘form’ in the item and of course the technique to be employed in the making of the item. Under this way of looking at things, composition, movement, form and technique can be seen as the principles of jewellery design, principles which the jewellery designers make use of in making their work.
Looking at one of these principles of jewellery design, composition, this turns out to be principle that guides the jewellery designers with regard to things like rhythm in the items, the relationships between the planes on the jewellery items they make, the distribution (statistical) of the materials employed in making the items, as well as the pointers on the items of jewellery. It is also under composition that jewellery designers look at balance and dimensionality in their work.
Turning to another principle of jewellery design, the one called ‘movement’ this turns out to be the one that deals with fluency in the items of jewellery so produced (where they are supposed to flow), while also dealing with the torque and drapery in the items. Without observance of this particular principle, the jewellery designers run the risk of coming up with pieces of work that look drab to the eyes of a person getting to view them, not because of what they are made from but rather because of poor workmanship. Indeed, it could even be mentioned that without observance of movement in jewellery design, it is quite easy to come up with products that look like ‘fakes’ to the viewer.
Under form, as a principle of jewellery design, we examine things like the functionality of the items made by the jewellery designers (because there is no point, for instance, coming up with a very beautiful ring, that is unfortunately uncomfortable or downright impossible to wear for the end user.
The moral in all these, to the people who are not jewellery designers, is that a lot of labour and skill goes into the making of the small-looking pieces of jewellery they buy in the jewellery stores ready made.