Nail Stud Earrings in 18k Yellow Gold

The Nail Stud earrings are made with nail heads set in hand-made 18k gold prongs.1790s-1820s square iron nails, 18k yellow gold, 14k backs.

The 1790s-1820s iron nails in these earrings are from my dad’s barn in Brooks, ME. As the building fell down he would separate the nails from the wood, which he chopped up for kindling. After years of collecting he sent them all to me for our first collaborative jewelry project. This type of nail was the first to be machine made, but it was still slow and laborious since strips of iron were fed into the machine manually and the nails cut one at a time.

Dimensions: 1/4" diameter of each nail head.