Athenaeum 2025 and the Future

Let me preface this by saying that the event was wonderful! I had many lovely conversations with all kinds of people throughout the day, both about my own work, and about others'. 

This was also the culmination of my project a month goal. I got to display all the works that I've made, along with the inspiration photos of them. If I had had room, I would have included a slideshow of process pictures. I had a lot of pieces, though, and still needed room for the me. Being this prolific, while working a full time job and studying for professional exams (and passing two!) has been a roller-coaster of emotion and stress. But I have learned a lot, and improved my skills in ways that I'm very satisfied with. 

There is so much that I want to do next, but I need to slow down and pick one thing at a time. I'm going to start off by finally making my period solder. Making it will be a matter of minutes, but filing it will be an activity for hours and hours. I won't file all of it. I'm going to give some away, and I'm going to keep some whole for display purposes. I'm planning to make at least an ounce, though (I need to double check the quantity of casting grain I bought), so that still amounts to a lot of filing. 

Once I have the solder, I can test it. See if it works at all, let alone the way I expect it to. If it does, I'm going to start using that as my primary solder. I'm super hopeful and excited about this. I want to remake the Hercules knot necklace. That will be my first real project, if the solder works. I'm going to test it on a simple bronze ring, first. 

Then I'm going to switch focus to research. There are a couple of books I want to get (we are rapidly running out of bookshelf space), and I'm really excited about them. And guess what? They're not about metalwork! I want to research Roman social structures, with an emphasis on slaves, freed people, and women generally. I am actively soliciting book recommendations on these topics. 

And that brings me to Athanaeum 2026, and what I hope to be able to present there: another, smaller selection of jewelry made with my own period solder, and research on Imperial Roman social structures. 

One quick note, the solder that I'm making is actually medieval, not Roman. Pliny says to solder silver with lead, and that's, for several reasons, not going to happen. Silver alloy solder is attested per Reynold Higgins, in his book "Greek and Roman Jewelry". We just aren't given the alloy in a primary source. 

I will leave you with a photo of the event, as well as my earlier test versions. We thought we were going to have 6' tables, and ended up having 8', thank goodness. 

Final display at the event. (Photo by Lissette de la Rose)

First try.

Second try. I think, had I say in front of the table, this would have worked. But in the end, I'm glad I went with the shelves.