I've been making jewelry out of metal for a number of years. While I've never studied formally at an art school or university, I've taken some classes, read a lot of books, and have a lot of hands-on experience. You can see some of my work here.

I've found that it can be hard to find book recommendations that are useful to me. Often, the reviewer lists the table of contents, but doesn't give much practical information. Jewelry is a very tactile medium, it's very visual, and it takes a lot of hands-on practice. I want to know if a book will be useful to me, way beyond my abilities, or just lovely eye candy. Reviews on sites like Amazon.com can be helpful, but often you have to read through a lot of people saying: "I really liked this one!" before you can find any practical details.

So I decided to write some of my own reviews, and see if other people find them helpful. Feel free to leave comments, and rate the book if you've read it yourself (the rating system is on the comments page).

I usually make jewelry out of metal, which includes techniques like sawing, filing, riveting and soldering (or, to be more precise, brazing). These techniques are generally — although not entirely correctly — referred to as metalsmithing. Because of my background, many of the books I'll review will discuss metalsmithing techniques. But I'm also interested in other ways to make jewelry; let me know if there's a book you'd like me to review (although I can't promise I'll get to them all). I'll probably start organizing the books by category, or tags, once I've done a few of them; but for now, feel free to use the Search function to find something you might be interested in.

When I can find them, I'll provide a handy link to a reviewed book at Amazon.com. But there are many useful books that have gone out of print, so don't forget your own local book store, used book store, and public library.