Nearly exactly three years ago to the day we were able to carry out a so-called Mjolnir, i.e. a pendant in the shape of the famous war hammer of the Nordic god Thor - also known as "Thor's Hammer" or "Thor's Hammer". Now - three years later - this Mjölnir should be complemented by a matching pea chain.
Despite extensive worldwide research by the customer and by us, we were unable to find a chain on the market that exactly matched the proportions of the Mjölnir and our customer's wishes and ideas regarding alloy, length, dimensions and function, either as new or as antique used goods.
That's why our customer made a radical decision: the matching chain for his Mjölnir should now be made by hand for him in our studio exactly according to his wishes.
A solid chain of this length and with 5,7 mm thick eyelets is not something I see every day, even in my long professional career. Customers usually choose such chains for their pendants from the necklaces that are usually plentiful on the market and are usually machine-made. But sometimes you can't find exactly what you're looking for there either. And certainly not with the incomparable flair of real handcraft.
It was immediately clear that the chain had to be precisely coordinated with the customer in every single detail. Before the very complex work on this really powerful and particularly classic pea chain could begin, all of the customer's wishes were worked out in detail with the help of countless emails, photos, voice messages and phone calls and individually coordinated with him before the craftsmanship was implemented.
What proved particularly helpful was that I made a small silver sample for my customer in advance and sent it to Norway, which he could compare with possible machine-produced alternatives to help him make his decision.
But then the time had come: I could finally get started! What lay ahead of me was – to put it positively – a lengthy and at times almost meditative work process due to the constantly repetitive work steps.
First, I melted down the desired alloy and rolled it into a square wire with the appropriate external dimensions. This square wire was then welded together using a so-called “Drawing iron“, which gave the gold wire, which had previously been repeatedly annealed, a semi-circular cross-section whose dimensions corresponded exactly to the individual chain links required by the customer. The constant annealing after each drawing process – which hardens the metal due to the enormous pressure and the extreme compaction caused by it – means that the wire is always soft and ready to be drawn through the drawing iron again.
Finally, this semi-circular wire was wound around a so-called "tampon steel", which allows goldsmiths or watchmakers, for example, to produce small metal eyelets of any desired size. The resulting spiral tube was sawn into individual segments, eyelet by eyelet, using an extremely fine goldsmith's saw blade:
After bending, however, these eyelets still retain a little of the bend or twist that they acquired from the previous spiral winding on the tampon steel. To eliminate this small aesthetic defect, each individual eyelet was bent together separately and each seam was first soldered individually. Afterwards, all soldered eyelets were threaded onto a wire and pickled in diluted sulphuric acid, ie cleaned of all solder residue.
By hammering in a so-called ball punch, each eyelet was finally "straightened" from the inside. Incidentally, this punching in on the surface of the wooden plate of my workbench ensured that I will not soon forget the laborious work on this special pea chain. 😉
Now came what was probably the most thankless part of the work on this pea chain: the eyelets that had been so laboriously soldered and then just laboriously corrected and cleaned now had to be sawed open and bent open again individually so that they could be hooked into each other and soldered again. Only now could the individual chain links finally be assembled and their sawn seams soldered again.
All of the above work was repeated until the customer's desired total length of his chain was achieved. In order to connect the large Mjölnir pendant to the new pea chain in a flexible manner, I made a so-called "swivel" at each end of the chain, which has an internal swivel joint and thus prevents the heavy Mjölnir or the massive chain links from jamming while being worn. Incidentally, this function was particularly important for our customer, as the pea chain was to be worn every day. At the end, the entire chain was repeatedly pickled in sulphuric acid and after external cleaning and smoothing of each individual eyelet on the polishing motor, polished to a high gloss and then finally cleaned in an ammonia ultrasonic bath.
At the end of the complex work, my customer was able to call a unique pea chain made especially for him his own. He flew from Norway to Frankfurt and then drove to our studio in a rental car to pick up his chain in person - together with a particularly good friend from Sweden. Now the existing Mjölnir could finally be "married" to his new pea chain on site.
I will probably never forget the happy expression on my customer's face when, in an unobserved moment, he was completely absorbed in himself and was able to hold his dream, which had finally come true with such enormous effort, in his hands, visibly satisfied and completely inspired...
The feedback from my customer after a few weeks was ultimately the greatest reward for me:
“…Now my Mjölnir, made by Stefani, has got its “missing link”!!!
A completely handmade, solid pea chain… which is super comfortable to wear despite its “enormous” total weight!
I wear these all the time, whether at work, doing sports, always…!Thanks to the perfectly functioning swivels incorporated on both sides, there is no twisting, snagging or anything similar, even in extreme conditions!
I am overjoyed with it, absolutely thrilled and so is everyone who sees this masterpiece!
I thank Stefani for her endless passion, her skills and her patience with pedantic customers like me.
…And to the gods for people like Stefani! …“