The making of filigree jewels

Filigree is a handiwork made up by carefully twisting two thin, slightly flattened gold or silver filaments. The threads show delicate geometric and nature shapes that capture the attention of people admiring artistry and beauty.
[Due to scarcity of gold and in order to widen the market silver is also used. Nonetheless time spent in gold jewelry is better rewarded ]

MOMPOX
Located in the Bolivar Department of Colombia, Mompox is an architectural jewel itself that has been preserved almost intact since more than 130 years thanks to its isolation. Mompox's history has been attached to the Magdalena River since her foundation. The river gave her birth, wealth and glorious moments. Nobody was happier or luckier than her inhabitants.

Mompox has no gold mines. The needed gold is brought by traders and miners from nearby locations as Martin de Loba and north Antioquia, but not in the amounts that used to be in the past.

ART OF PATIENCE
From the outset people from Mompox dedicated to filigree art have excelled in creativity and try to bring every jewel to perfection.

Since the beginning craftsmen employ three metal transformation techniques, namely filigree, moulding, and printing. Gold and silver transformation matches with fine details which can be observed in her architecture especially in the wrought iron work exhibited in doors or windows along her streets.

Master's house is the working site. He is the artisan who masters the technique of transformation of gold and silver; he is also the one in capacity to lead the group and solve oncoming problems. The official is the skilled worker in every phase of the process of production. The apprentice is the one who starts learning the techniques.

TRANSFORMATION PROCESS
1. Cleaning
To get the so longed gold thread it is necessary to set apart any impurity attached to the metal coming from earth or from the streams. Once the metal is pure, with no quicksilver in case of gold, it passes to a laminator, chopped into lamellae and put into a bulb lamp without the filament in the presence of pure nitric acid. Lamellae are allowed to boil in the acid at slow fire on coal. The presence of a red smoke indicates the outset of the purification; if the smoke is white, the metal is purified. When the gold is soft it is mixed with certain amount of silver and copper to make it workable.

2. Smelting
Gold and alloy are deposited in a refractory earthen spoon where they are set to fire with a gasoline blowlamp until they are fused. The melted mixture is immediately poured into a ‘rielera’ (a mould with some cavities resembling rails) from which the ingot comes. Some oil is used to make the melted metal flow easily. The cold ingot is forged on an anvil for compacting the metal, proving its ductility and obtaining a four faceted rod.

3. Lamination
Once the forged rod is obtained it is re-heated with the blowpipe and passed through the laminator, a hand moved machine. All the time that the rod is in the bores of the laminator it is re-heated to prevent the silver from hardening. The resulting wire is re-heated and flattened at one end to be stretched in the liners (a kind of iron pieces with 30 micron graduation) which give a better finishing than the laminator. The stretching of the wire goes from wide to narrow holes.

4. Twisting, flattening and assembling
The thread is re-heated again, bent and twisted with the aid of two wooden clappers. The twisted thread is then flattened. With the final thread both the framework and the fillings are made according to a previous design. The framework is the support where the rolled threads are set to represent a butterfly, a frog, or whatever figure the designer has in mind.

5. Welding and finishing
In this step the threads are fixed together and to the framework using less valued gold for welding. In this process the gold pieces are set on top of a wooden board or pumice and a gasoline torch is used to solder them.

The piece is whitened with a mixture of muriatic acid, salt, and water and after that immersed in 24 carat gold to even up the color. It is then polish with soap and finally washed with abundant water.