Sea Turtle Earrings

My sea turtle images were originally inspired by a trip to a sea turtle rehabilitation facility in Topsail, North Carolina. I was absolutely captivated by these wonderful creatures and knew that they needed to make their way into my work.

These images were hand-sculpted from a flat sheet of sterling silver using small blunt tools and thousands of hammer blows. This technique is called chasing and repousse (chasing is to work from the front of the piece, repousse is working from the back to push out the metal and create depth). The work is done freehand, so no molds, machines or stamps are used in the process. This work results in a truly unique and one of a kind piece of jewelry.

These sterling silver earrings are about 1-1/2 inches long. There are two styles of earring available. One has a continuous earwire and is very light and easy to wear. The other has a frame around the earring to give the illusion of thickness but this frame does not add considerable weight. This second earring hangs free from a sterling silver earwire.