British Silver week

A few photos from the Rising Stars day at the Pangolin Gallery as part of British Silver week. A great day for all of the exhibitors and a my first piece of silversmithing on display.

Rachel Jones and Collette Bishop

Martin Keane

Nicola Turnbull

Me!

Hand pierced and engraved decorative jewellery box. Sterling silver with an Indian rosewood turned base. I was vey happy to receive the Malcolm Appleby award for design and creativity in engraving for this piece.

www.britishsilverweek.co.uk

Bishopland at Collect

So I've been a little behind but here are some pictures taken of the Bishopsland exhibit at Collect. I was helping out on the Friday and Sunday and got to meet so many people and peek around Collect whenever the chance arose.

My perspective may have changed slightly since my last visit to Collect, looking at the prolific silver vessels by Ndidi Ekubia and Hiroshi Suzuki (both Adrain Sassoon) I did still take the time to see some beautiful jewellery up close, even getting to touch the Golden fleece ring by Giovanni Corvaja made from gold wire drawn down to the width of a hair.

Other favourite jewellers were Jacqueline Ryan at the Scottish Gallery and Zoe Arnold at CAA.

Elizabeth Peers

Theresa Nguyen

Nan Nan Liu

Malcolm Appleby

And last but not least Chloe Robertson and Katherine Priest. Two of this years current gang selected to exhibit with Bishopsland Fellows.

Experimenting with gold

For two days Cooksons provided myself and the rest of the Bishopsland gang the opportunity to experiment with 18ct Gold. Not only that, we were lucky enough to learn from Goldsmith Jacqueline Mina for the duration. Above are some of the samples I made from the masterclass using a combination of fusing, rolling, piercing and press forming.

Preston to Pitlochry

With a brief visit to one of the girls houses in Chorley, four of the Bishopsland gang including myself headed up to Pitlochry for a week of creative hand engraving with Malcolm Appleby.

It was a pretty full on week, with the amazing opportunity to work with Malcolm Monday-Friday. Watching him at work was an amazing experience and getting to see the wanders in his workshop was a great inspiration. As were the surroundings......

Hopefully the results (after a lot of practice!) will begin to show in my new work.

http://www.craftscotland.org/profile/218/malcolm-appleby/

Pitt Rivers trip

A few photos from my trip to Pitt Rivers a few weeks ago. I was looking for inspiration for a large piece I am designing. Particularly interested in protective amulets and how they are carried/ attached to the body. Had a great tour from one of the guides there, showing us frogs with nails through and shrunken heads.

Thorn spring forceps.

Shoulder slung charm amulet.

Kingfisher feather inlay necklace.

Bone and shell large necklace

Pitt Rivers Museum, from the first floor.

A selection of brooches and amultes, two part brooches with hanging chain in between.

Design time.

I've been knuckling down this week, taking a look at where my work is at and how this is going to inform my new collection. I'm going through my research and taking a trip to Pitt Rivers tomorrow for some much needed inspiration will hopefully solve a few problems I'm having!

This is a bit of a Fiona mood board, as it stands right now......

V&A archives Padgett and Braham collection.

A couple of weeks ago we started a project with the V&A archives, looking into a collection of models and sketches taken from Padgett and Braham Ltd when they ceased trading. These objects and a brief history from Silversmith Gareth Harris, a former apprentice to the firm, gave us an insight into the origins of the company and what exactly we were looking at. Now there opens up a world of possibilities....