Edinburgh jeweller

It’s time to take a break! Grab yourself a cup of tea and a biscuit and enjoy some inspiring jewellery! The Saul Bell Design Award is a jewellery design competition which awards ‘an original vision, a fresh take on traditional methods and materials and a mastery of your craft’ The award is split into six categories, with five finalists per category (seven finalists in the emerging artist category). The six categories are Gold/platinum Silver/argentium Metal clay Enamel Holloware Alternative metals/materials Emerging artist The winners have now been announced! Prepared to be inspired by the winners (and I recommend a look at all the finalists whose work is just astounding). Gold/platinum The Queen" by Garen Garibian (USA) Silver/argentium "Unity" by Seung Jeon Paik (USA) Metal clay "Adore" by Rodica Frunze (Canada) Enamel "On The Wing" by Debbie Sheezel (Australia) Holl...

My colleague at the London Jewellery School Hayley Kruger has been busy of late! She can be seen as a guest designer on Jewellery Maker as well as a tutor at the London Jewellery School and for Jewellery School Online . Her most recent course for Jewellery School Online is a soldering masterclass and it is currently available for pre-order at an early bird price of £49 instead of £79 (price will increase from Sunday 19th June 2016). The course is designed for beginner and more experienced silversmiths who want to master soldering and struggle particularly with more advanced and complex pieces. What you get included with this course Lifetime access to 6 comprehensive video lessons, guiding you through all the techniques, tips and tricks to perfecting your soldering Downloadable course notes to work alongside the videos Access to our supportive community of jewellers and tutors to help you at every stage of the process Access to the videos 24/7 - you can stop, pause...

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It’s a big birthday year for the Queen this year, she turned 90 in April. However, the Queen also has another birthday celebration, an official birthday which is today! Apparently we have been celebrating the official birthday of a monarch in the UK since 1748 and the Queen’s official birthday moves to whichever date is a Saturday between 11th and 17th June. I had to stop and think about the complete genius of this idea. Surely we should all follow the Queen’s lead and adopt a second birthday that is on a Saturday (I’ve chosen 9th July this year!). Anyway, I've been using this double birthday celebration as a great excuse to enjoy some of the Queen’s extensive and beautiful jewellery collection! The tiaras are gorgeous but as I can’t wear one everyday (hmm, can I?) I’ve been focussing more on other jewellery in her collection. The Queen was given this Cartier bracelet for her 18th birthday in 1944 The Queen’s platinum and diamond engagement ring The Queen wore a ...

Whether to rent a jewellery studio or work from home was an issue that has been at the forefront of my mind this year as followers of the blog will know. I was wanting to further develop my jewellery business and teaching and it was one option to consider. I looked at whether there were studios available locally as I knew it was unlikely I’d want the cost and time of travelling too far. I hadn’t found anything that I thought would work for me. Luckily, serendipity happened to help me out! I was working one evening at the London Jewellery School alongside tutor Penny Akester and it transpired that she was looking for someone to share a studio with at Craft Central ! It was great timing and a good opportunity to share the costs as well as to have someone to work alongside. The studio when we took it over! I got my keys at the beginning of May and Penny and I spent a day building flat packed furniture to furnish our studio (here we are in action!) We had a deadline t...

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At the London Jewellery School I will be hosting the first ever Metal Clay Guided Workshop on Thursday 30th June, but what is it? Would you love to work on your own silver clay projects in our well equipped workshop with an expert tutor on hand? Do you find you achieve more during a class than you ever can at home? At LJS we are trialling the metal clay guided workshop , an opportunity for you to work on your own designs and project ideas and to have help and support from an expert tutor and your fellow students. The idea for this workshop has come from feedback from our more experienced students who wanted a way to develop their skills and work alongside other metal clayers in a supportive and inspiring environment. Who is the guided workshop for? The metal clay guided workshops are designed for intermediate and advanced silver clay students. These sessions are different from our usual classes as there will be no organised tuition, you bring along your own designs and i...

Another day off, another gothic building! It was a bank holiday here in England on Monday and we thought we would take the opportunity of an extra day off to visit Strawberry Hill House in West London. It’s been on our list for a while! It was created and built for Horace Walpole in the 18th century and is full of all the gorgeous design features I love in a gothic building. As always, I was taking photos of the tiny details (very inspiring for jewellery) while Gary was taking the bigger scale photos. What a team! Photos by Gary Ullah