The Art of the Wax: Carving Trace and Wax Build-up for Flow

What makes handmade jewellery different?

Step into the studio and you'll notice it straight away — the scent of wax warming under small blue soldering irons, a soft heat in the air, and two benches in constant use.

I move between a long bench and the jeweller's bench. Both end up scattered with tools. The long bench, no matter how often I clean it, always carries traces of the work — drips of blue, green, and red wax set into the surface.

Most jewellery today begins as a digital file. Clean, precise, repeatable. Mine doesn't.

Each piece starts as wax. Not drawn. Not printed. Made. Carved into, built up, reshaped, and worked by hand until it feels right. What you wear is the final version of that small sculpture — translated into metal, but still holding every mark of the process. That's where Trace and Flow begin.

Subtractive Wax Carving: How the Trace Ring Is Made

The Trace ring begins with a solid wax ring blank. This is a process of subtractive carving—finding the form by taking away the excess.

I cut the width of the ring using a saw, then open out the inside using a wax cutter that burs away the centre to bring it close to size. Because wax shrinks slightly during the lost wax casting process, the ring needs to be made a little larger than the final finger size.

From there, it's about refining the form. The outer surface is filed down slowly and deliberately until the proportions feel right. This is the stage where the ring is brought to a near-finished state — edges smoothed, surface even, everything considered. It's careful work; you can repair a break by melting wax back over it, but I'd rather not need to.

Once the form is right, the direction shifts. Using burs, I begin to cut back into the surface — removing material to create the distinctive Trace texture. It's a balance between control and restraint. Push too hard and you risk breaking through into the inner band.

The act of taking away is what defines the piece. The small cuts, edges, and irregularities become the design. A record of the process; a trace of the hand that shaped it.

Wax Build-up: How the Flow Rings Are Formed

The Flow rings work in the opposite direction. Instead of carving away, I build the form up using a technique known as wax build-up.

The base ring is first carved to the correct finger size, but the outer surface is left more open and raw—ready to be built on rather than taken back. Using heat, the wax softens and begins to move — almost like a liquid — before it sets again. It can stretch, pool, and fold back into itself to create the initial surface.

Then I switch to a wax pen. Small drips of molten wax are applied one at a time, forming into tiny rounded beads across the ring. They settle into the surface like raindrops on leaves or on glass — a defining feature of the Flow collection.

There's less control here, and that's part of the point. You guide the process, but you also respond to it. Each layer builds on the last, creating ripples and movement. It can take a couple of days to complete a piece; if you apply too much wax at once, the ring holds the heat and can start to warp. The process requires a specific rhythm: build, pause, cool, continue.

Where Trace is about restraint, wax build-up is about letting the material lead. What you see in the finished piece is a fluid state captured and fixed in metal.

Lost Wax Casting: How Wax Becomes Metal

Once I'm happy with the wax ring, it moves into the final transformation: Lost Wax Casting.

I work with a specialist caster just down the road from my Mt Eden studio. The wax ring is encased in a plaster-like mould and heated. As the temperature rises, the wax melts away — leaving behind a hollow cavity that is an exact match of the original form. Molten silver, bronze, or gold is then poured into that space.

The original wax is gone.

There's also a small element of risk in the process. It doesn't happen often, but occasionally a cast doesn't come out as expected — and when it does, it's back to the bench to begin again. Where's the fun without a little bit of risk?

The mould captures every mark. Nothing is smoothed out or standardised. What was made by hand remains visible in the final, solid metal form.

Frequently Asked Questions

• Is wax-sculpted jewellery durable? Yes. Once cast in metal, it's as strong as any solid sterling silver, bronze, or gold piece.

• Can these rings be resized? In some cases, yes. It depends on how many sizes you need to move. Heavily textured rings are less likely to be resized without affecting the design.

• Will the texture wear down? Deep, hand-formed textures are designed to last. They may soften slightly over years of wear, but they won't disappear.

Join the Bench

Some people want to wear the piece. Others want to understand how it's made. If you've ever been curious about the process, you can try it for yourself.

• Shop the Collection: Explore the Trace and Flow rings — each one shaped by hand and cast as a one-off or small batch.

• Make Your Own: Join a Lost Wax Workshop and spend three hours carving, melting, and building your own ring in wax. You'll work through the same wax build-up and subtractive carving techniques used in the studio, then I'll cast and finish your piece for you. (We'll leave the sapphires for another day — that's a more advanced step!)