Royal College of Art Public Exhibition 30 June - 3 July 2023

 

RCA2023: Royal College of Art Battersea

I will be exhibiting my work made at the RCA in the Woo Building on the first floor. 

Woo Building
Royal College of Art
Howie Street
London SW11 3AN

30 June – 3 July 2023

From 30 June to 3 July, MA students who started in September 2022 will be offering visitors an insight into the RCA’s work and creativity, through exhibitions, events, interactive activities and discussions with artists, designers and creative practitioners.

Opening hours

Open to the public from 12–6pm daily, with a late opening on Friday 30 June until 7.30pm.

Getting to the RCA

For information on getting to the RCA, and the accessibility of our campuses, see Visiting the RCA.

RCA2023 online

Physical exhibitions and events will be accompanied by a digital platform allowing visitors from across the world to discover content by theme and collections.

Craft Festival Bovey Tracey 16-19 June 2022: stand A11

 

I'm delighted to be participating in the Craft Festival at Bovey Tracey for the first time this year. You can find out more about how to get to the festival and how to buy tickets here: www.craftfestival.co.uk/Visitor-info-BoveyTracey. 

The festival is open Friday - Sunday from 10 - 5 each day. 

Directions

SAT NAV co-ordinates TQ13 9AL

Bovey Tracey is only 2 miles off the A38 Exeter to Plymouth Expressway.

Exit the A38 at Drumbridges Roundabout and follow signs to Bovey Tracey town centre. 

Follow the AA signs to The Craft Festival. 

Nearest train station Newton Abbot. Regular buses from Exeter, Torquay and Newton Abbot stop at Bovey Tracey. The nearest train station is Newton Abbot. Bus 39 takes you to Bovey Tracey from Newton Station. Exeter International Airport is 18.5 miles away. 

Tickets available here: www.craftfestival.co.uk/Ticket-info-BoveyTracey

 

Whiteknights Studio Trail 2022

Whiteknights Studio Trail 11 & 12 June 

11 – 12 June 2022 Whiteknights Arts Trail at the Museum of English Rural Life. 11 – 6 each day.I'll be there, next to the cafe with all the cakes, ha! I'll be alongside Ursula Waechter, a ceramicist. 

Oxfordshire Artweeks 14 - 22 May 2022

I am taking part in Oxfordshire Artweeks once again this year! It is 14 - 22 May 2022. The opening hours are 10 - 5. 

I will be there: 

10 - 12 on Saturday 14 May 

all day Sunday 15 May with a special Meet the Authors events with my co-author Janet Richardson. 

10 - 1pm  Friday 20 May

all day Saturday 21 May 

I am exhibiting with 4 other jewellers in a fabulous barn filled with other art such as paintings and ceramics. There's also a lovely farm shop in which you can get a snack or hot or cold drink. And there's plenty of easy parking! 

Venue

Peach Croft Farm Barn

Twelve Acre Drive

Abingdon

OX14 2HP

Website: 

http://www.peachcroft.co.uk

Facilities available: 

Accessible for Wheelchairs, Demonstrations, Refreshments, Parking

Various jewellery related goings on: book and locket

It's been a while since I posted, mostly somehow lost in a lockdown fug where every day sort of passes in similar fashion. But this very, very long month of March is drawing to a close. The sun is shining, the daylight is longer and the spring flowers are out in full force. Hurrah! Let's hope we have a lovely summer, getting closer to being safer with every vaccination! 

In book news, my and Janet's book Silver Jewellery Making is out there in the world. Janet went on Jewellery Maker TV and for a brief moment (about half a day), our book had the coveted "Best Seller" banner on Amazon in our category of metal work! That was quite exciting! Also very thrilling for us is that we are now on TWO recommended book lists. The first is on Metalsmith Society's page, here: https://metalsmithsociety.com/pages/book-recommendations. The second is on Nottingham Jewellery School's blog, which is here:  https://www.nottinghamjewelleryschool.co.uk/post/reading-recommendations

On that second list, check out the Jewellers Creative Journal if you fancy some help with your creative process. I haven't seen it yet, but a friend recommended it and said it's great if you're just starting building up your own designs.

Both of those are well worth following on Instagram, by the way, if you're on there, at @metalsmithsociety and @nottinghamjewelleryschool

Otherwise, I have been busy making lots of new jewellery pieces. At the moment, I am on my quest to make modern lockets. This is one of those lockets. It's my "mini orb" locket, made from sterling silver and 13mm in diameter. I am enjoying getting a better grip on hinges, learning what to look out for and what works well. I figured out that several times, I thought the hinge knuckles were sitting nicely in their little groove, but it turned out that they were ever so slightly *above* the bottom of the groove, which meant that later down the line, the fit was not as good as I wanted. So I've learned to get the loupe out and check under the hinge knuckles from the side to make sure they are sitting down properly in the groove. The tube I'm using is 1.2mm outside diameter, so loupe required! Anyway, here are photos of my mini orb locket: 

Publication day of Silver Jewellery Making: a step-by-step course

 

 

The day is finally here, our book is published!!!! Hard to believe it, but it's finally here. Janet and I are doing an  Instagram takeover for the publisher, @searchpress if you want to follow us there. Apparently there are some delivery issues at Amazon UK, but there are plenty of other places to get the book:

• WH Smith
  
• Waterstones
• Blackwells
• Search Press
• Guardian Bookstore
• Amazon USA
• Penguin Random House
• Bol.com in the Netherlands
• Amazon Germany 

This is me at my bench and the photo below is Janet at her bench :-) 

The making of a silver mini locket with a gold ball

Lockdown 2.0 projects! I've been working on a mini locket. Below are the progress photos and also photos of the finished item!

This is the locket before any findings were added:

 And here we have the beginning of the hinge:

 

 

This photo shows the first two side knuckles of the hinge, each about 1mm wide.

  

 

This photo shows the hinge with the middle knuckle now also attached.   

 

 

Here is the tiny bit of tube being soldered on to make the clasp on the other side of the locket:

 

 

 

This is the beginnings of the part of the clasp that will hold the locket shut.

 

  

 

This is the locket before finishing and before the hinge has been properly finished with a rivet.

 

 

Finally, here we have the finished locket. It is a mix of argentium and sterling silver, with an 18ct gold ball embedded in the front which is also visible from the inside. The silver has a brushed finish. And the cat is my parents' cat, Miles, because why not?

New Jewellery on Not on the High Street

 I've been tidying up my Not on the High Street shop by adding new packaging and gift tag options. I also added these four new pairs of earrings:

 

Update on Silver Jewellery Making book and other things

 I'm delighted to be part of the Craft Council Directory - a fabulous list of many of the amazing makers in the UK across many disciplines. The link is: https://www.craftscouncil.org.uk/directory/machi-de-waard-jewellery

In book news, Silver Jewellery Making is nearing completion. By completion, I mean nearing the end of many, many stages of editing. We're down to the nitty gritty now!!! The marketing team have made this lovely leaflet:

 

 

I'm working on some new pieces - namely five pendants - which I will hopefully have photos of soon. 

Silver Jewellery Making book

Janet and I have been hard at work trying to make our book, Silver Jewellery Making, the best it can possibly be. Yesterday we had the last photo shoot at our publisher, Search Press. We added extra images to clarify some techniques and took many photos of tools to show them more clearly. We also added more images to properly illustrate our "how to design" chapter. The photographer, Mark, did an amazing job. Between him and the design direction from Search Press, the tools were turned into works of art! Below are a selection of photos from the day. The cupcake snuck in there because one of the team at Search Press had a special birthday and we luckily got to join in with the cake! The book is coming together well and I really hope that by the time it's published in February 2021, we will be able to throw a big party and invite loads of people!

cupcake

Files made to look beautiful!

the propane torch gets its time in the limelight (although all the projects in the book are done with a handheld torch, we wanted to show different torch options).

tools and the big lights for the photos

silver being photographed

lace bangles

At the beginning of lockdown, I worked on several jewellery projects that had been languishing as low priority items on my bench for quite a while. One of these was a lace imprint bangle. A while ago, I made this bangle with three little claps that were meant to be reminiscent of a corset fastening:

Hm, I can see my photography skills have improved since then as well, ha! Anyway...I had been thinking for ages that I wanted to improve on the clasps with a slightly different look and a better solution for soldering them (if you look very closely at the above bangle, you can see the solder join on the wire clasp bits isn't quite rounded at one part). So, I finally got around to it and was very pleased with the result. It looks like this:

There's an inside lip under the clasp to make it really smooth on the inside for comfortable wearing. The clasps are easier to use because they have a little bobble on them, plus I like the look of them! It's quite an old fashioned clasp, often used on the side of bracelets as an extra safety clasp to make sure it can't open and fall off.

Also, I've joined Instagram, find me there: @machi_jewellery

Jewellery made by my students

This term has abruptly ended because of the current virus situation, so I thought I would share some photos of jewellery made by my students in Chesham and Reading this term.

Made by Gill: hammered texture napkin ring

Made by Jane: matching set of earrings and ring with bezel set agate cabochons

Made by Kirsty: punch pattern silver cuff bracelet

Made by Natalie: small bezel set onyx stud earrings

Also Natalie: a rather fabulous rectangle statement necklace. Although it did get amended later because it didn't hang quite right, but I don't have a photo of the updated version!

Made by Rachel: a ring with a large, beautiful stone and on a double ring shank beneath.

Also made by Gill: a swirl of silver wire necklace

Made by Ruth: a very impressive small box with friction fit lid and tree and leaf decorations in brass.

Made by Sarah: a large checkerboard cut stone ring. The stone has subtle colour changes in the light.

Made by Maureen: an impressive cuff bracelet with a simple and elegant result that took quite a lot of effort!

Made by Cora: a very impressive square box with bezel set coral cabochons. Nobody ask how long this took!!!

Made by Helena: elegant moonstone cabochon cufflinks.

Made by Tony: two tube settings on a d-shape ring shank.

Made by Jo: a successful bezel set rose quartz ring.

Made by Gill: bezel set small oval amethyst dangle earrings.

Made by Cora: unusual stone bezel set with decorative gallery wire. Don't mention the melted ones!

Made by Victoria: fun and effective school of fish silver cuff bangle.

Made by Sarah: a brilliant result - hinged square locket with clasp!

Made by Cathy: fabulous rectangular box with friction fit lid.

Made by Susanna: hammer texture pendant with blue cabochon stone.

Made by John: twisted wire rings.

Made by Gill: I forget the name of these things - silver twist and pin to hold a knitted cardigan together.

Made by Jane: ammonite bezel set from the back (this is the front).