A Coordinated Pair

A couple came to me looking for a pair of rings that would always bring them back to a special place. A little back-and-forth in the design process, and we settled on putting the latitude and longitude coordinates of that spot on the rings and completing them with a heavily weathered, distressed finish. (I explored that briefly in the previous post). We went with an old typewriter typeface. All the numerals and letters were hand inscribed with a bench scriber. Before beginning all that, the bands were turned on a lathe.

In the end, I decided to do the bulk of the distressing in the wax stage, since abusing the rings after I had applied the coordinates just might result in some friendly fire casualties that might be hard to salvage, especially since the bulk of my wear-and-tear work was to be done with a hammer. I chose to avoid that risk. I want the rings to look old and used (and so do my clients!), but I also want the coordinates to be visible and clear (don't want anyone getting lost in the woods!). We'll see how the final result looks after casting, but here's what we have so far:

Coordinates, marked with a superfine marker, drawn by hand, with guidelines scribed by a divider (kind of like handwriting practice for first and second graders - form the letters properly, stay inside the lines...).

The other side (Sorry about the focus. Shot with my mobile phone).

Carving and distressing complete. The camera is not kind to wax, unfortunately.

A bit better view. The typeface is inscribed, as though it were stamped in. 

What a difference a Sharpie marker makes. I ran the marker over the waxes, then wiped off the rings, leaving a residue in the crevices. Now you can see the work better.

Some of the distressing on the ends is more visible here.

Another view.

Soon to come, the rings in .950 palladium.