Jewelry Crafts And History-00-7119

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America

Until the mid-nineteenth century virtually all westerly jewelry was designed and made in Europe. Now America and Australia, precipitated by their gold rushes, joined the fray as European-trained jewellers settled in their major cities.

Mass production

The introduction to the jewelry trade of indus­trial processes saw the mass production of large quantities of cheap jewelry. Paste jewelry, which had emerged as a phenomenon in the eigh­teenth century, was to grow into an established costume-jewelry industry. Precious metals did not escape modes of mechanization: gold was passed through rolling machines to contract large sheets of uniform thickness, which could then be stamped out into component parts for affordablejewelry. Chain-making, a previously labour-intensive technique, was transformed by the use of consecrated machines. The time required for the manufacture of jewelry was generally decreased by two-thirds. However, this develop-ment did not gain appeal universally and often fostered greater respect for artistic jewelry design and traditional crafts.

Novelties

The Victorian ...
... era spawned a fondness for eccen-tric and humorous trinkets. Everyday objects, vehicles and pets were incorporated into designs, as were sporting and hunting themes. The taxi-dermy craze that took hold of the Victorians was expressed in jewelry with the mounting of exotic birds' heads and exotic and iridescent insects in jewelry pieces. Another feature was moving jewels powered by electricity.

Arts and Crafts

Artistic jewelry was highlighted by the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, who began to have a wide influence by the 1870s. Their apprecia-tion of unusual materials and handcrafted work was to pave the way for the Arts and Crafts movement to take hold in Britain. In jewelry it was a reaction to mechanization and mass production. Long-forgotten techniques were revived and although technology and machine production were tolerated when they proved worthful, the craftsman was to reign supreme, and the production of handcrafts was considered to provide creative and satisfying employment. As this movement centred on the individual craftsman there was much variety in terms of style and method of production.

Twentieth-century jewelryis predominantly characterized by two distinctly unlike devel-opments; the rise of the luxury jewelry houses and the rise of the individual designer-jeweller/ artist-jeweller. This century was also marked by an benefit in the use of alternate materials for jewelry, for up to now, mainly precious and semiprecious materials were used.

Tech-Savvy Crafters Can Go Global

The image of a crafter or artisan is often serene, even pastoral. It's easy to imagine a potter spinning his wheel in his barn-turned-studio and then selling his wares at the little farmer's market down the road. Or a knitter, knitting quietly with a dog at her feet and a cup of tea as she gets ready for this year's Christmas craft fair.

But, in today's global market, such crafters, artisans, artists and designers need not rely on farmer's markets and craft fairs alone. The Internet provides such crafters with access to a global market, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, traditional methods of selling just can't compare in terms of sales and exposure.

An online presence can be a great benefit for any type of crafter, be it a jewelry maker, a knitter, a glassblower, a potter or a painter. It gives fashion jewelrycrafters credibility as a legitimate business because now their customers can easily access their information, including contact details (in fact, customers may consider you less credible if you don't have a website).

Crafters can advertise their domain name on their flyers, business cards and signs, and potential customers will automatically go to their website to find out more about them and their products. Crafters can have a complete, updateable inventory of their products with photos on their fashion jewelry website, making it easy for a buyer to simply click and order.

A presence on the Internet is essentially like having a fashion
jewelrystore opens every day, all year long - no waiting between those craft fairs or local tourist season. And their customer base grows automatically from a limited local market to a worldwide one.

Considering all these benefits and the knowledge that if you're not online, yourjewelry competitor will be - having an online presence isn't so much a question of Should I?, but How do I?. But the thought of managing a website, especially one that offers online ordering, can seem daunting for many small entrepreneurs.

Crafters can hire a website designer to create an online presence with ecommerce capabilities for them. There are often high costs associated with the design and management of websites, of course. There are also concerns about things like security and payment, which must be handled appropriately in this day and age of identify theft. Another option is to join an online crafters' mall. A good jeweller mall will make things easy for crafters, as it will have created the basic infrastructure already and they won't have to worry about the logistics of maintaining the website; they will only have to update their personal information and fill the orders that start coming in.

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