Inspiration

What a beautiful set up! I just love this image! It’s simplicity really enhances the focus. I found it on decorati.com – check out the site on my ‘Inspirational Links’ its great

This painted and carved wooden frame mirror is also form decorati.com The atmosphere in this picture really inspires me…the old world, worn, warm feeling you get, a sense of extravagance and beauty with a simplistic air.

I tend to draw a lot of inspiration from a large variety of things in life, not always tangible, often its just a feeling that a certain atmosphere ignites in me, and I’m growing more aware of what kind of settings source my creativity. Recently i have been consciously making an effort to recognize and contemplate my response to my surroundings in terms of how it affects my creativity, and actually am trying to ‘create’ space for myself that is filled with inspirational things. I have been pleasantly surprised at how much enjoyment I am getting from doing this and it has opened my eyes to a lot of different things that seed ideas

Patterned Tiles

I’ve been looking at a lot of different patterning lately and how they link up into each other and repeat themselves, and I found these great tiles on www.anchorbaytile.com

I‘ve come to a little bit of a realization… I’ve always had an intrigue with layers, in all forms; be it physical layers in art, architecture, nature and all the everyday things we come into contact with, or symbolic layers, layers to personalities and stories etc
After much thinking and discussion, it dawned on me that my quest of experimentation with different techniques to create pattern in jewellery could be spurred by this enjoyment of layers. I think that through all this experimentation I have been subconsciously trying to find different ways of creating depth and ways to bring about layers into my work…. just a thought, will see where it leads!

Testing the waters…

It’s about time I tried out some reppousse! After gathering a few pointers from fellow students, I plucked up the courage to finally grab a pitch bowl and get to it. I started with a fly pressed oval dome (as I was thinking about a locket) but realised very quickly that my technique was nowhere near good enough to jump straight to that, so I took a step backwards and began on a flat copper plate. It was very challenging, and the outcome was dreadful to say the least, but I’d started….

A bit dispondant but determined, I tried again on a piece of silver plate, slightly thicker, and the result was far from good enough but most definately an improvement! I would really like to persevere in this and try and develop my reppousse and chasing. I know it’s going to be a slow and frustrating path to take but with patience I’m sure I will gain alot of experience and satisfaction in the long run.

First Attempt

Second Attempt

Memories

I recently happened apon a beautiful silver teaspoon that had belonged to my late grandmother. Immediatedly it brought back wonderful memories of my younger days spent at my Grandparents’ ; old large Rhodesian houses with beautiful wooden furnature and ornamentaions of all sorts influenced by a covetted British upbringing. A mixture of beautiful porcelain china and silverware, with rustic lampshades and dusty Zimbabwean landscapes…..all this from a little teaspoon .

I was very drawn to a beautiful motif imbedded into the spoon and have been inspired by it considerabley in terms of designs for my jewellery, and my journey in exploring different ways of ornamentation in jewellery.

This week I have found myself asking a lot of questions and contemplating aspects of decoration that I had not previously given much thought to…

In the Victorian era in particular, but still up until this day, people decorated themselves and their surroundings with such extravagance in order to demonstrate their wealth…why feel the need to demonstrate the wealth you have? Is it absence of personal wealth and richness within one’s self that one needs to replace it? Yes, for some it brings satisfaction to display and gain acceptance from others through it, but why?

When we decorate and enhance the beauty of something( including ourselves) is it a form of appreciation to accentuate the beauty, or is it the lack thereof , that makes us feel the need to create beauty on the mundane in order to appreciate it, or acquire appreciation from others?

Or is pattern and decoration and ornamentation, all just forms of expression, an appreciation and representation of the beauty of character inside us that we are so scared to surface and therefore acknowledge it in other things?

Etched Earrings

Bracelet

I‘d like to play around more with this, developing it into a bangle.

Pierced Ring

This ring was inspired by another one of my pattern doodles, and the techniques I used previously in the brooch.

In looking back at all the pieces I made last year, this brooch is the piece I like the most and was happiest with. I asked myself why, and realized that the overall look, based on the pattern and techniques used to create the pattern, was what I enjoy about it. This was very significant for me because it lead me to the realization that in most of the things I have been drawing inspiration from ( namely old vintage and antique things ) it is either fine intricate pattern or workmanship that I am drawn to the most, and inspired by. It is this realization that has lead me to want to experiment and try out different techniques with which to introduce a form of patterning to my jewellery. At the moment I am focusing on surface decoration, experimenting with techniques such as hand carving in wax, etching and piercing and the use of Rhinoceros3D to create patterns. I would like to learn reppousse and chasing, as well as trying to make press dies for my patterns.

These are wax pieces that I have hand carved and cut in Rhinoceros3D

Brooch

This sterling silver brooch, was inspired by a pattern I had found and wanted to play around with. I really like the overall look of this piece.

Beauty Within (Ring)

This locket ring with garnet follows the same concept as the locket I made previously; Precious beauty kept on the inside, away from harm, much like how people protect themselves from being hurt by creating a facade. I have pierced a pattern in the top lid, so that a slight hint of what is inside can be seen.

Beauty Within (Locket)

This sterling silver locket is a portrayal of how people are often miss-judged, and how there is so much beauty and character to be discovered hidden inside someone. What they seem on the outside is only the tip on the iceberg.

I have created an open section on the front of the locket as a ‘peep hole’ to what’s inside. Once the locket is opened, a pierced, oxidized door seperates the two sides, allowing something precious to be enclosed.

My Jewellery Photo Album

My Photo Album

Last year I decided to make a range of jewellery linked to personal memories. I created what I called ‘My Photo Album‘ where I took old photos of special people in my life and set them into jewellery, with a verse that I relate to that person or memory, engraved on the back.

This developed from the concept of the locket, where one carries or wears a photo or something special close to their heart.

I set the photos in ‘liquid glass’ and mounted them
in sterling silver frames.
^ Pendants of my mother and father

^ Brooch of my Grandparents

This pendant captures memories from my childhood in Zimbabwe.
I felt these memories needed to be captured and set because it is
no longer the country I remember it to be and is no longer the
home of my past, so this piece was almost a preservation of what
is left of the Zimbabwe I know.

I set a section of the old Zim $2 note, with a sketch of an orchid
flower over.