From concept to cufflink
by Dianna
Plenty of people ask me how the cufflinks evolve from ideas in my head to finished products.
This was a huge learning curve for me when starting Miss Links. I was not a designer; I was an accountant. I was more at home creating Excel spreadsheets than tinkering with gemstones and precious metals. But I learned—fast.
The bow cufflinks are a good example.
Around Christmas, I was inspired by all the gorgeous packaging with bows and I considered a bow cufflink with crystals. I thought a bow would be a perfect choice for a feminine and pretty cufflink for women. Check out my first drawings! Not great.
My trusty designer turned the rough sketches into the versions below… much improved!
Once I decided the final design, my Sydney prototype agency created CAD files which the manufacturers use to create samples.
Below are the samples I received: no crystals, unpolished stainless silver and the cufflinks are not fitted with a clasp—you need a good imagination in this line of work!
I also got a sample of bow cufflinks without crystals, which turned into Alexandra, sterling silver bow cufflinks.
Despite the good samples on my desk, the production process was far from over. The next step was to choose a suitable range of crystals to adorn the bows. I decided to use Swarovski, only because they’re the best, and I wanted Miss Links to be top quality.
Here’s the range of Swarovski crystals I had to choose from – talk about overwhelming!
As you can see in the photo below, I played with darker toned crystals but the contrast wasn’t right and this red sample never made it into production.
You can of course easily see the final cufflink crystal choices which were Alice, in light rose, Annabelle in light sapphire and Jessica in peridot.
So as you can see, there’s quite a lot that goes into production of your Miss Links cufflinks! The entire process can take up to one year.
PS. Look who came sniffing round the photograph session. They just KNOW how to get in the way, don’t they?