Sheet metal becomes a bowl, a cuff or a curved component because it's hammered against a shape — a stake. Hammers get all the glory, but the stake is what actually decides the form; the hammer just delivers the energy. Understanding the pair together is the doorway from flat, fabricated jewellery into hollow, sculptural, three-dimensional work, and it's less mysterious than it first looks.
Raising, sinking and planishing
Raising moves metal — you hammer annealed sheet down against a stake to draw it up and inward into a vessel or a curve over many patient courses. Sinking is the simpler cousin, pushing sheet down into a hollow to form a shallow dish. Planishing then refines whatever you've raised — light, overlapping blows with a polished hammer against a polished stake to smooth the earlier hammer marks, even out the surface and work-harden the metal so it holds its shape. A double-ended forming stake with synclastic and anticlastic faces covers both single- and double-curvature work in one tool — a genuinely versatile first stake that won't be outgrown quickly.
The hammer half of the pair
Planishing needs a hammer with a mirror face, because every mark on the hammer prints straight into the metal — a scratched face means a scratched surface, every time. A planishing hammer with both domed and flat faces lets you smooth curved and flat areas with the same tool. Keep both the hammer and the stake polished and rust-free — our guide to anvil and stake care explains why a single spot of rust on a stake will ruin an otherwise perfect finish.
Anneal, form, anneal
Metal hardens as you work it and will eventually crack if you push too far without softening it. The whole process is a rhythm of moving between the stake and the torch — the cycle is covered in annealing and forging silver. Listen to the metal: when it starts ringing harder under the hammer and resisting the form, that's it telling you to stop and anneal. The same skills feed directly into repoussé and chasing, where you push relief into supported sheet from both sides.
Starting out
You don't need a rack of specialised stakes to begin — that comes later, if at all. One good double-ended stake, a planishing hammer and a polished steel bench block will take you a remarkably long way and teach you the fundamentals of moving metal. Build from there as your forms get more ambitious and you discover the specific curves you keep reaching for.
Find stakes, planishing hammers and bench blocks across the Hammers & Forming range.