Room With A View

My workshop window (aka the once 'spare' room) overlooks our extension roof, and the backs of other people's houses. Not the best view in the world! The window itself is very small, and although I sit right next to it the amount of natural light is minimal so I have a daylight bulb too, or I would never be able to wrap tiny wires! I'm eventually hoping to move into a studio in the garden, maybe next year if I can get things moving! Watch this space...

However, whilst the view itself isn't always inspiring, here in the UK of course we get bombarded with all kinds of weather conditions - never too much of anything (including sun in the summer, unfortunately!), but it's always changing, and from my little window I'm usually the first to spot the first flake of snow, or an approaching storm. My school reports were always full of 'spends too much time gazing out of the window'. Guess nothing much has changed then! ;o)

Queen of Hearts

Another sterling silver piece hand-sawn from a drawn design. This features a cut-out of the heart shape, and I've added a lovely denim-blue sodalite cabochon.

The pendant measures approx 3.5 cm in length and just over 3cm wide.

Tick Tock Earrings

Some more metalwork this time, from one of the many sketches/designs I have littering my desk! I'm beginning to feel a little more confident about setting saw to silver now, without worrying that I'm going to waste a perfectly good sheet of metal by making a horrible mistake. If I do, so be it! There is only one way to get better at it... :)

Hand sawn, shaped and filed from sheet silver, with black onyx cabs.

These are about 4cm long but still quite lightweight, and I love the shape - they remind me of clock hands.

Spice Trail

I've recently started supplying jewellery pieces to a newly opened local shop, Glacier Arc (in the Buttermarket, Newark -on-Trent - go check it out if you can, it's a beautiful shop!).

These are a couple of things I've sent already, I believe the necklace has already gone :)

Spice Trail necklace - Swarovski crystals and freshwater pearls in lovely autumnal shades of warm copper, gold and rich burgundy, sterling silver and wire-wrapped.

A pair of matching earrings, again with Swarovski crystal and freshwater pearls, wrapped onto handmade fine silver headpins.

More clusters please!

Everyone's crazy for clusters at the moment - it's the one thing my stockists can't seem to get enough of! These long tassel necklaces are really popular, and very tactile too. The headpins on these are handmade - I always make sure the heads are nice and smooth on each pin to make sure they don't scratch the skin or snag fabric.

Earrings to match - these are Swarovski crystal briolettes with a gorgeous bicone mixture in pale blue/sandy colours, with Swarovski pearls.

As always, click on the pictures for a closer view! :)

How do you doodle?

I love reading books on creativity, although I don't seem to have a problem with finding creative ideas just lately - more an inability to stick to one thing at a time!

I've been reminded in many of these books about how a child will pick up a crayon and just draw, without any hang-ups or worries about ' what shall i draw', 'will it be good enough', and the dreaded 'blank page' syndrome many of us seem to suffer from!


So, I decided to start doodling again - something I used to do a lot, usually on scraps of paper or notebooks whilst on the phone. It's a great way to get the ideas flooding!

Inspired by browsing through my Arts & Crafts/William Morris books, I've drawn this tile using a black ink pen, and then watercolours - felt very strange to have a paintbrush in my hand, it's been a long time - but great fun! So much so, I started another - so the second one is work in progress!

Black Onyx Earrings

Some more sterling silver earrings, again hand sawn and pierced. These have black onyx - I love the contrast between the deep black of the cabs and the shiny silver! I was hoping to give the appearance of the stones being 'held' at the bottom - I *think* I've achieved that! :)

Swarovski and Silver

Sometimes I'm so busy trying to get nice, attractive pictures of my jewellery, that I forget how deceiving they can be - especially close-up photos, pieces can often appear huge compared to how they are real life!

So... some fresh photos of these latest pieces, and especially for Katrin! :)

On a roll !!

Another hand sawn and pierced flower - this time in sterling silver, and with paparadscha Swarovski crystal.

The pendant is quite dainty at just 2 and a half cm, the cab is 5mm :)






The earrings are sterling again with gorgeous erinite Swarovski crystals.

These measure approx 2 and a half cm long.



I think I need to buy some more silver! :)

Spinel Heart

Just a quick one! Finished off this pendant today, sawn and pierced sterling silver with a faceted black spinel marquise bead. :)

Must try and get a better picture of this!