Glacier Ring

The weather has been super hot in England recently, the perfect excuse to cooooooool doooooown with a G&T. I recently tried Professor Cornelius Ampleforth's Bathtub Gin (very kind of him) as well as an interesting Saffron Gin, sat canal-side on a lovely sunny evening in Chester. The sound of ice cubes clinking around in a tall glass is music to my ears.

 This new ring is part of the collection in the exhibition:

 "JUST RINGS #1" in Toulouse which starts NEXT WEEK by the way.

 If you can, imagine a giant high-ball glass so big you could dive straight into it with a chunk of iceberg floating in it to keep it cool. That is what I was thinking of when I was making this during the soaring temperatures.

Egyptian Reggae

 

Lapis sculpture 200AD

 I've always loved Lapis Lazuli since an early project on the Ancient Egyptians in Primary School. I  got extra marks for also "mummifying" one of my dolls to hand in with my folder on Tutenmen*. *(I had concentrated so hard on neatly colouring in the ancient lettering on the binding I'd spelled the Boy King's name wrong). Alluding to some of the grisly processes with the shorn head and a bit of felt tip for some stylish eyeliner on little Sindy, I also used plastic trinkets won from Christmas crackers and 20p machines as the protective amulets tucked into the bindings. If we had a school counsellor I probably would have had to have a little chat.

Wednesday Addams performs a touching service for Red Riding Hood

Anyway, here are my resin and pyrite earrings inspired by the deep blues of ancient Lapis.

Exhibition Just Rings - Toulouse

I am THRILLED to announce that I will be exhibiting a collection of pieces at this exciting exhibition in Toulouse! 

It will run from 5th June - 5th July in the stylish gallery of Violaine Ulmer, a fantastic contemporary jeweler who's own designs stand out as unusual pieces of wearable art. The gallery can be found at 33 rue Bouquières, right in the beautiful antiques quarter of Toulouse.

Also, out of the 41 artists chosen to exhibit, there are only two others based in England, so I am proud to also be representing Blighty amongst this group of great designers.

Here is some more information from Klimt02 (INTERNATIONAL ART JEWELLERY ONLINE)

The ring - a timeless object

Hewn 

ring with shard and metallic

The ring exists since the beginning of time. Testimonial of an epoch and a certain way of being, it is the most
sought-after piece of adornment. Unique pieces or very limited series, all 217 rings selected for just rings, #1 are one by one handmade by the artist-artisan-designer himself. They differ in techniques and are made of diverse materials (silver, resin, ceramics, caoutchouc, steel, iron etc), but all 217 exposed rings show extraordinary quality.

Black Beam

oxidised silver, resin & copper lustre

Precious Birthday Finds

These are a combination of  recent birthdays in the family. The "Ancient" bottle opener featuring a lovely little Athenian owl motif (a symbol of wisdom) I sourced for a present for my "brother-from-another-mother".

The chunk of pottery we found during my sister's birthday camp at the edge of a lovely Welsh lake. It is a mighty hefty wedge of old ceramic, be nice to get it checked out, I'll write up if/when I get round to it (even if it turns out to be just a piece of petrified biscuit. ESPECIALLY if it is a piece of petrified biscuit).

This is the lovely lake where the piece of pot was (the little white rock on the left was the anchor for the chilled champagne) :)

And that's me paddling at the front of the canoe! So much fun!

 Night Owl

+=

Combination of getting "back to nature" and celebration bubbly resulted in an owlish eyeliner experiment with a new liquid liner I'd just bought. I like that anything goes when camping, you can become you're favourite woodland animal. You see it at festivals. Something about not having walls just helps people, erm...let their walls down...the booze and music etc helps too though probably.

a baby "Little Owl"

(Athena Noctua)