This article will cover how rings are usually made, what forging means, and what goes into a ring that is marketed as forged.

For access to my full collection of forged rings (every piece of jewelry I've made and sold) click here. Please note that not all pieces are available each month. If you're wondering whether a piece of jewelry will become available in the future, please message me directly.

How to make metal rings

Most jewelry you've come across in your lifetime is not made with forging techniques— it's made using casts. Often times an artist will carve the piece from wax before the actual piece of jewelry is made. Fun tangent: This is also done with cars.

Once the wax carving of the piece of jewelry is made, things begin to branch out depending on the artist. Some send the carving out to have molds made by third party companies. If I made jewelry this way, I would have every piece I planned on selling at any scale scanned into a digital file to save myself time in case something happened to the wax carving or the piece I was saving.

My personal favorite method (again, that I don't use) involves destroying the original wax carving. It's my favorite because of its simplicity and is totally in line with the old inventiveness spirit that surrounds metalworking.

The carving is placed into a cannister with a straw stuck to the bottom of it. A solution is then poured into a cannister that when dry can withstand the temperatures needed to melt both the wax and handle the molten metal of choice for the finished product.

For a great video on this method check out Alec Steele Making Wedding Bands! on Youtube.

Rings and other jewelry made this way, fall into the casting category.

Forging rings

In order for a ring to be considered forged, it needs a single vital component: Hammer blows. There's a whole discussion out there about the merits of using the terms hand forged (hammered by hand), cold forged (forged at room temperature with extreme pressure; done by machines), drop forged (use of power hammers or hydraulic presses), etc. Each one of these has its place.

My work is hand forged, with all bench work being done by hand hammers. It's effective for the pieces I create. For my application, a power hammer would crush most of what I'm working on.

That said, I've made axes and hammers by hand before.

Here are my sentiments about that:

Never again.

Use of heat

Now forging and casting (with the exception of cold forging, which will be left out of the discussion from this point on) both make use of heat.

Casting is the melting of metals so that they may be poured into a mold, kind of like chocolate, and then cooled until they harden into shape.

Forging uses heat to soften the metals, thus making them more maleable and in a state where they can be shaped while minimizing damage to the work piece. 

Some pieces will crack or shatter if extensive hammer work is applied when cold.

Quenching

Often times forged work is paired with quenching particularly when it comes to evaluating the authenticity of an artist's work.

In traditional metalwork, quenching is most often used to alter the properties of the workpiece. It's used to make a knife hold an edge better, or to make a blade bend with some force applied to it, but snap back to true after the force is removed.

Final thoughts

If you're looking for forged rings, there's a good chance you're looking for a piece worked by hammers, heated with a forge, and then quenched in oil.

If this is the case, then I recommend evaluating any ring or piece of jewelry you are looking to buy using the above three factors.

Once again, my full collection of forged pieces can be viewed here.

I also reccomend a competitor of mine on etsy. Their name is Lucas and their shop is SimasDesigns. To see their shop click here. Their aesthetic is more in line with traditional blacksmithing, like something you'd find at ren faires here in the states. Definitely lend them your support :)

If you are just looking for the word forged or if you think cold forging is really fascinating, you now know a little bit more about what you're getting!