The making of the Beijing Olympic medals in jade
Sunday, August 10, 2008 at 06:57AM
As well known to all of you, the backside of the Beijing Olympic Medals is made in white jade from Geermu (Qinghai) for the gold medal, greyish jade from Qiemo (Xinjiang) for the silver medal and green jade from Xinjiang for the bronze medal.
In the following pictures you will be seeing some of their manufacturing steps!
The ancient master for the Beijing Olympic Medal
Cutting the raw jade
The jade workshops
Cutting out the jade rings with a CNC milling machine
The finaly sizing of the outside diameter of the jade ring
The masters in plaster of the metal part of the medal
The metal blanks for the bronze medal
The medal stamping die press
The wings of victory
The engraving and machining of the medal holder
Inspecting the machined medal holder
Assembling the bronze medal with the green jade ring
The metal part of the gold, silver and bronze medals ready for assembly
The medals ready for the Olympic Champions.
Images courtesy of www.beijing2008.cn
Reader Comments (1)
You will recall that we first saw the Olympic medals on this site when I posted the front and back views of three designs more than a year ago. Now you can see the results on TV several times a day. If you want to see how the medals were made you can see them clearly on the new post from our Chinese connection, Herbert Giess. Enjoy them.
Fred Ward, Friends of Jade