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Jewelry Process

Broken shards or cracked pots are sent from Mata Ortiz to Taxco to Salvador and Lorena Barrera. Salvador cuts and smoothes the ceramic pieces into shards around which he and his wife create a piece of jewelry.

Salvador Barrera cutting pottery with diamond saw.                              

Lorena and Salvador designing pendant with the shard and silver 

The shards and pencil sketch are given to Agustín Torres Beltran, a native of Nahuatl Indians found west of Taxco in the mountains of Guerrero, a state in Mexico.  Working in his bedroom or on his balcony, he fashions by hand .950 silver to fit each shard into a specifically built bezel.

Soldering back to bezel.

Using a small saw like a coping saw, to remove excess silver from back.

Using the saw to make bezel height an exact fit to the thickness of the shard.

Adding silver wire as per blueprint.

               

On “balcony workshop” cleaning, polishing, and buffing the piece.    

Without touching the silver, Agustín using a tool to bend the bezel over the shard