Edinburgh jeweller

I'm looking forward to attending the You Can Make It residential metal clay conference in just a few weeks time. Although I'll admit I'm not looking forward to the train journey! This time last year I still lived in London and so the journey was only a few hours. This time I live in Scotland and it's likely to be at least 7 hours on the train. I looked at the option of flying but I'm teaching soldering and need to bring all my equipment. I didn't fancy getting there to find my butane torches had been confiscated at the airport! I'll do a blog post on my epic journey! I've just checked, it's 470 miles away. Last year I only had to travel 130 miles. Anyway, I've been getting ready for the conference, writing some notes for my workshop sessions, making sure I have all the materials and samples I need etc. One of the fun things I've been preparing for is the charm swap. We make charms and then swap them with others at the conference and make a...

I'm really excited that the silver clay tutorial I wrote for Making Jewellery magazine had been published. I was even more excited that my work was chosen for the front cover! I was commissioned to write the tutorial by Sian Hamilton, the editor of Making Jewellery magazine. Each issue has a theme and the theme for issue 114, January 2018 was fire and ice. I was asked to make six different pieces, write the step by step instructions and take photos as well. It's a lot to do and I didn't have a long time to get it done. I started off thinking about designs. I actually started making a totally different piece but I woke up one morning and decided it wasn't complex enough for a tutorial. It was two days of work and I had to start from scratch but some elements of the idea did stick. I decided to make lentil beads. These are round beads that are domed. It's an interesting project that works well in silver clay with lots of possibilities for beginners and mor...

Black Friday has arrived and along with it an astounding amount of offers in my inbox and on facebook. For an American tradition it really has found some traction here in the UK! Don't get me wrong, I will be looking at whether I can get some christmas present shopping done but I noticed that there are some great offers out there for metal clay artists to invest in their own training or to stock up on supplies. So, with that in mind, here are the deals I've seen that are worth a second look 1. 20% off day and evening classes at the London Jewellery School As you probably know, I work for the London Jewellery School. If you'd like to take a class with me there you can see my teaching calendar for 2018 here (it is possible that there will be some changes but right now I am the one due to teach the classes listed above). For me, learning face to face with an expert tutor is the quickest way to develop your skills. It allows you to ask questions and practice with feedb...

I'm beyond excited to announce that I will be teaching at the You Can Make It UK residential metal clay conference, 24th-26th March 2017.  There are metal clay artists travelling in from all over the world including Wanaree Tanner Anna Mazon Julia Rai Tracey Spurgin Joy Funnell To be in the know use this link to  sign up for updates about the conference .  I will post on the blog when the YCMI website is up and running and let you know about the classes I'll be running.

I am very fortunate to be one of the early testers for Art Clay 950 , a product currently available for pre-sale from Metal Clay Ltd and launching on 1st September. I wrote about my experiences with it in a previous blog post here . In this post I want to focus on the enamelled pendant that I made. Making the pendant I used a Quick Art template and the Quick Art stylus from Metal Clay. I rolled the stencilled section out at 3 cards thick. It was easy to cut out the stencil using the stylus which has a really fine tip. My previous needle tool made that quite difficult because the needle was thick so it was difficult to get a neat line. I dried and filed the stencilled section. I then added it to a 2 card thick layer of wet clay. Once dried I cleaned the edges with baby wipes to ensure no join was visible. Firing I fired the pendant on an open shelf on vermiculite in the following two part firing schedule Once your piece is completely dry put it on a ki...

I am very fortunate to be one of the early testers for Art Clay 950 , a product currently available for pre-sale from Metal Clay Ltd and launching on 1st September. I have really enjoyed working with it today. It's so similar to original Art Clay in terms of rolling, texturing and cutting. It take a little longer to dry but I found I had a longer working time too. What is it? This is a new product from Art Clay , one of the two main suppliers of silver clay in the world.  Silver clay is made up of fine silver particles, an organic binder and water. Art Clay 950 is 95% silver and 5% copper. The original Art Clay is a purer silver, 99% silver and 1% copper. What are the benefits? Strength You might be thinking, well the original Art Clay is a purer silver so isn’t that better? The answer, of course, is it depends on what you want! Art Clay 950 is 60% stronger than original Art Clay because of the copper content. This means it is more suitable for making rings, ...

Demonstrating using silver clay paste to make a leaf pendant As I mentioned previously on the blog, I'm part of the Metal Clay Makers group. I was really pleased that I was able to attend the Metal Clay Ltd summer social last week. I live quite far away from Metal Clay but luckily I was visiting family close by so I decided to drop in and I'm glad I did! It was the first time I'd visited the new premises and I enjoyed a browse around the showroom and a look at some of the products available including a new range of bronze clay that I am looking forward to trying out. I also had another look at the amazing jooltool polisher that I am coveting!   As part of the evening a couple of demonstrations had been organised. Petra demonstrated how to use silver clay paste to make a leaf pendant. Even though I have done this before I still learnt some great tips including about embedding wire into the piece to create a bail and using Plasticine to press the leaf into in or...

A few months ago I applied to be a Metal Clay Maker and am excited to announce that I was one of six people chosen! Who are the Metal Clay Makers? The Metal Clay Makers are a small group of designers who choose to use Metal Clay Ltd products in their work because they believe in their quality and reliability. Metal Clay Ltd support the MC Makers with materials and tools, provide lots of inspiration and advice, send them new products to test and critique, and enjoy regular chat sessions. What does the programme entail? It is a sixth month programme, beginning in July, to try, test and review products from Metal Clay Ltd. Why did I apply? I decided to apply because I use and recommend Metal Clay Ltd products all the time, they are one of the main suppliers for the London Jewellery School pop up shop (where I work). Additionally, I loved the idea of the challenge element of it, to use materials and tools I might not otherwise try and see what comes out of that ...