You may have noticed that we work with silver a lot in the studio because of its importance to Eduardo’s Peruvian heritage. But do you want to know what goes into silver jewelry making? Learn more by watching some of the videos below which we produced in our in-house jewelry design studio!

What Is Pure Silver?

Pure silver, also referred to as fine silver, has actual silver content of 99.9%. Because of its high purity, fine silver is too soft to use in jewelry making and is often mixed with other metals to make it harder.

Melting and making sterling silver

925 Sterling Silver is the standard of quality for items containing 92.5% pure silver and 7.5 % copper. Legally, 7.5% of any metal may be used with the product still marked as sterling.

Copper is added to .999 fine silver to become sterling silver, and the melting point of Sterling silver is at 1640 degree Fahrenheit

Melting silver and pouring into ingots

Copper is added to .999 fine silver to become sterling silver, and the melting point of Sterling silver is at 1640 degree Fahrenheit. Here, Eduardo is pouring into a mold and ready to be laminated.

Laminating silver sheets

To control the thickness of silver sheets, we do a process called laminating.

What does it mean to anneal silver?

Annealing is basically making the silver softer by the application of heat. It is a crucial step towards silver jewelry making. The annealing temperature of silver is between 1110-1200°F unlike its melting point which is 1635°F. (890°C)

Soldering basics

Soldering refers to the fact that two pieces of metal are joined together using heat and the appropriate type of solder. The best way I can describe solder is it’s a metal alloy that ‘glues’ pieces of metal together. Use silver solder for silver, copper and brass. Gold solder for gold metal – which requires a higher temperature than silver.

Polishing silver