How It's Made

About Us

We are both from Manitowoc and grew up on Lake Michigan. These shores have always been part of our lives and it's also where we got engaged. Turner started with one tumbler, and we figured out the rest as we went. Our most important goal is to make rockhounding inclusive and accessible. We also want our pieces to be handcrafted yet affordable enough so that anyone can own a piece of the Lake.

The Rockhounding

Turner heads out after storms or in winter before the ice shelves form. That's when the waves are doing the most work and fresh rocks are constantly being pushed ashore. Sometimes he's wading into the water to reach better spots. He picks whatever catches his eye. Common specimens are quartz, granite, and basalt, but on a good day a fossil, geode, or an agate will appear.

Letting the Stone Speak

Once collected, each stone is assessed and assigned to one of two processing paths, tumbling or slab and cab. The decision is based on the stone's shape, size, and internal structure.

The Tumbling Equipment

Our setup lives in a basement and was built mostly by hand. We run a range of tumblers, from multiple 3-pound barrels, a 12 pound, a 65 pound, and a 165-pound barrel that Turner built himself from 12-inch PVC pipe. All of them are rubber-lined to reduce noise and improve tumbling action. They run on a homemade pulley system with a variable speed motor, and sit on a steel plate to keep the vibration down. The 165 lb barrel was built to handle very large stones that no commercial tumbler can accommodate. It is constructed from 12-inch diameter PVC pipe, 3 feet in length, with PVC end caps sealed with construction adhesive. Because of its size and the tumbling action, it generates, stones processed in this barrel only require Stage 1 and Stage 4, skipping the intermediate grits. This allows for large specimen output and high-volume processing.

The 4-Stage Tumbling Process

The tumblers run continuously 24/7. Rocks are cleaned between every stage, and the whole process takes anywhere from five to eight weeks depending on the stone.

Stage 1 starts with coarse grit, rough rocks straight from the lake, tumbling for about a week until the edges start to soften. Stage 2 moves to a finer grit for ten days, working out any pits, cracks, or rough spots. By Stage 3, another ten days with even finer grit, the stones are completely smooth with a faint shine starting to show. Stage 4 is the polish, one to three weeks, and when they come out, they have a mirror finish. That's when they're ready to be transformed into pendants or stand alone stones.

Slab and Cab

Some stones are better suited to slabbing and making into cabochons (cabbing) particularly those with interesting internal patterns, color, or structure that tumbling would not reveal.

The Slab and Cab Equipment

The slab and cab process uses three pieces of equipment: a 7-inch slab saw, a drill press, and a homemade flat lap machine. The flat lap machine was designed and built by Turner using a variable speed angle grinder mounted upside down on a concrete and wood base. The design minimizes vibration and allows for controlled hand-sanding through multiple grits. Turner developed the design through research on lapidary forums including Rocktumblinghobby.com and through significant hands-on troubleshooting over multiple iterations.

The Slab and Cab Process

Stones are first cut into thin slabs using the slab saw. This process is similar in concept to slicing deli meat, exposing cross sections of the stone's interior. Each slab is then hand sanded on the flat lap machine through 7 progressive grits, producing the same mirror like finish as tumbling but completed in hours rather than weeks. Once polished, stones selected for pendants are carefully drilled using a drill press. Each stone is drilled individually by hand.

Jewelry Finishing

Jewelry findings are then added to complete the piece. There are no molds, no casting, and each piece is finished by hand.