Tag: lapidarist

Posted on

MBMAG September Speaker: Sky Paxton- All About Agates, Sept. 21, 2018 from 7-9 pm, Moss Landing

Lapidary and jeweler Sky Paxton will share his love and knowledge of agates with us on Friday, Sept. 21, 7-9 pm at the Moss Landing Harbor Master’s Office.

Sky will share slides with examples of various types of agates, locations where they are found and some factors that affect prices.

He’ll also give us some tips on hardness and cleavage planes of popular stones which affect their use in certain types of settings.

Sky has been working with stones for many years, so bring your questions about working with these varied and beautiful stones.

This meeting is free and open to the public.

The address is 7881 Sandholdt Road, Moss Landing.  After you enter the driveway to the Harbor parking lot go to the building all the way to the end of the parking lot on your right, “Harbor Master’s Office”.

Posted on

Bruce McKay: Ways of Holding, MBMAG Monthly Speaker Series, April 27, 2018

Bruce McKay with torch and optivisors

April 27, 2018

MBMAG Monthly Speaker Series

Making jewelry requires holding onto things that are often funny shaped, too small, too hot, too delicate, and so on . Bruce’s talk is about ways to hold stuff while creating your jewelry. This includes holding items while soldering, creating assemblies of item to be held together while soldering such as clusters of heads, holding onto items while filing and sanding, holding irregular shaped metalwork while setting stones, and much more.

The tools and techniques will all be demonstrated at this talk for MBMAG at Creator Haven on April 27, 2018 from 7-9 pm. Light refreshments will be served.


Bruce McKay is a gold/platinumsmith, jewelry designer, lapidarist and graduate gemologist with 47 years experience who has recently moved to the Santa Cruz area from Portland, Oregon. There he had a custom design studio for 30 years and for the past 6 years has taught advanced jewelry techniques at the Multnomah Arts Center. Now a member of MBMAG, Bruce is past president of the Creative Metal Arts Guild of Oregon. 

Creator Haven is located at 41B Hangar Way, Watsonville, CA 95076