Making earrings with vintage rhinestones

Recently we introduced a new line of materials for jewelry making: vintage rhinestones and brass prong settings. These rhinestones differ from cameos and cabochons in that they don't have a flat back for gluing, but they can be set in the matching prong settings. These settings have four metal points that can be folded over the rhinestones with a pair of flat nose pliers. Many of these rhinestones were made a long time ago in former Czechoslovakia. If you are familiar with Czech glass beads, you will know how radiant the colours are and that it is high quality glass. You can find rhinestones with and without foil on the back. The foil is used in the transparent stones to reflect light through the stone, making them sparkle even more. To give you some inspiration, here is a tutorial for some earrings made with vintage rhinestone

Materials for making vintage rhinestone earrings.

What do you need?

• Rhinestones
• Prong settings
• Earrings
• Jump rings for connecting the pieces
• A pair of flat nose pliers

Put the rhinestone in the prong setting and fold the metal points over the stone.

Tips on assembling the earrings

• The first time you try to close a prong setting might feel a bit clumsy.
• The easiest way is to put the stone in the open setting and hold them between the thumb and index finger of your left hand (if you are right handed). Holding a pair of flat nose pliers in your right hand, push/squeeze the metal prongs over the stones one by one.
• The earrings that were used here have an opening in their eyelet. You can fold this open so you don't need an extra ring to hang the setting from.

Attach the prong setting to the eyelet on the earring.

Combinaties

Gold earwire with fuchsia pink rhinestone OH013B

Jump ring gold 4 mm OR-G001

Vintage rhinestone ruby emerald green pear 10x6 mm PNS-P008

Vintage rhinestone navette opaque turquoise 15x7 mm PNS-NV008

Prong setting with 2 loops for pear rhinestone brass 8x5 mm KLZ-P001B

Prong setting with 1 loop for navette rhinestone brass 15x4 mm KLZ-NV002A

Prong setting with 2 loops for navette rhinestone brass 15x7 mm KLZ-NV001B

Gold earwire with cobalt blue rhinestone OH013C

Testing for nickel

Nickel allergy: It's a problem many women run into when they wear jewelry. Nickel is a metal that is commonly used in metal alloys. And not just in cheap materials; even low-content gold is sometimes mixed with nickel. An allergic reaction usually occurs when you have been exposed to nickel for a longer period of time (and if you are sensitive to it, of course). Most coins, for example, contain some nickel, but we never touch them long enough to get a reaction. But if you were to wear an earring with traces of nickel, then that could result in unpleasant reactions. It may cause itching, eczema, or make your earlobes swell up. In short, this is something you really don't want when you're wearing jewelry!

This is why I have always been very cautious about buying metal parts. I have never blindly trusted my suppliers' promises that their products were nickel-free.
Recently, I have started testing my metal products for nickel myself. I bought a nickel-test at an on-line allergy shop. Thy sent me a plain white bottle, containing a substance called Dymethyl Glymoxime. You just need one drop on the metal you are testing, and then you rub it in for about a minute. If your cotton swab turns pink, then your metal contains nickel.
The first time I tried this out, hardly anything happened. The cotton swab turned a bit brownish. Was this nickel, or just some dirt or tarnish on the surface? I looked for some jewelry that I was sure contained nickel.
This is what happened to the bracelet. I put a drop of the tester on the back, and the liquid changed colour immediately. This was pink. This was nickel!

A second bracelet gave even more exciting results. The liquid spontaneously turned fuchsia and spread through the material. Rubbing wasn't necessary, the test was positive.