Angelo Kreuzberger
Boltenstern cooksongold
Beads and gem stones are set inside the cage mid-way through the build of the 3D printed cages.
WINNER of the TCT Creative Award 2018. Submit your design-to-manufacturing innovation for this year’s TCT Awards here.
Cradled inside a precious metal cage is a stone. A group of them dangle from an ear, a necklace, a bracelet. It is architecture in its smallest form, the result of technology meeting tradition, the product of Marie Boltenstern’s influence on an Austrian jewellery atelier born in the 1960s and renowned for catering for the rich and famous.
Marie took over the company from her father, Sven, in 2015. Not long after, having taken the decision to explore the potential of new technologies, she witnessed a presentation delivered by Cooksongold at Basel World, where the application of additive manufacturing (AM) technologies in the jewellery sector was the focus. From here, an alliance blossomed, all Boltenstern jewellery pieces are to now be 3D printed, and in September 2018, the output of this collaboration was recognised at the TCT Awards as the best creative application of the technology that year.
The Embrace collection is a series of jewellery pieces, which offer a degree of customisation. Coloured beads or gemstones are woven into cages which are 3D printed in silver, platinum, 18K red gold, or 18K yellow gold. Customers can choose to have a number of cages, a variety of different coloured stones, and alter the size of the piece, which could be a bracelet, bangle, chain, or earring. The combinations go into the thousands.
Cooksongold oversees the production of these pieces, the cages additively manufactured on EOS M 080 or M100 direct metal laser sintering (DMLS) platforms, with the stone being set mid-build, rather than the cage being assembled around it afterwards.
Then comes the post-processing. Such is the nature of the jewellery market, the surface finish must be perfect. And jewellers use the angle of reflectivity to make sure that it is.
“If the incoming light reflects at the same angle as the outgoing light from the part, then all the light is hitting our eyes at the same time and produces a very highly polished, reflective surface. If it’s a slightly bumpy surface, then the angles of reflection are slightly different, so they’re coming off at different angles and it appears duller,” David Fletcher, Cooksongold’s Precious Metal 3D Printing Business Manager articulated. “That’s the requirement in the jewellery industry.”
Angelo Kreuzberger
Boltenstern Cooksongold Embrace
Ring and cufflink from the 3D printed Embrace collection.
Post-build, the support structures are removed and the parts undergo post processing, including polishing. Some pieces may then be rhodium plated to enhance the brightness of the finish.
These build and finishing processes were happening around the clock as before the end of the year. Five DMLS systems at Cooksongold’s facility were in operation 24 hours a day, while another at Birmingham City University was also being utilised on occasion, as Marie was working to fulfil an order in the thousands from a big Chinese retailer. There’s since been further interest from China, as well as Hong Kong.
It’s a significant validation of Marie, her aptitude in design, and her decision to adopt AM technology to build on the success of her father. She’s trained in architecture, and thus quickly picked up the Design for Additive Manufacturing skills, with the help of a set of guidelines supplied by Cooksongold, which details rules on orientation, build angles, and so on. The result is an award-winning collection of unique, additively manufactured, jewellery pieces.
“Marie is taking this traditional jeweller, and turning it into a 3D printing business,” said Fletcher. “And we’re at pains to point out that the Embrace collection cannot be made any other way. You can’t make those from traditional techniques. There’s a big opportunity for jewellery [in adopting additive manufacturing] and Marie is exploiting that.”
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