Snippets from our August 2013 Issue

Here is a selection of the articles that you can find in our 1st August 2013 Issue, No 24.

An Interview with Rowanberry Designs

We love your beautiful creations but tell us a bit about the lady
behind them.
I’m Claire and I live in Staffordshire with my lovely husband Tony and my fantastic (and very demanding) cats, aka “Fur kids”. I'm lucky enough to be a full time glass artist and jewellery designer.  I'm currently living in a built up area at the moment but I am country girl at heart, being brought up in Kent, then onto live in Wales before I came to Staffordshire. I love getting out and about in the UK and ‘experiencing’ and connecting to the landscape. It may be hard doing this living in an urban setting, but we are at least very lucky to live only a short trip from the Peak District, Cheshire and North Wales, so we try to get ‘out there’ as much as we practically can. I'm also a Pagan and environmentalist and this is central to my creativity as well as my everyday life. My spirituality, pantheist beliefs, and love of nature and the earth play a big part in my inspiration.

Have you always been creative or did your talent evolve over time?
I've always been involved with arts and crafts, and as a child I was always drawing pictures or doing something creative. This carried on through my whole education and after school I went on to study Fine Arts along with English at university.
   
I became a full time jewellery designer 10 years ago, including designing jewellery for a high street store for a while. I got into making glass beads in 2006 so I could use them in my handmade jewellery, however the love for making them overtook my life so I just focused on glass and that is when Rowanberry Glass Art was born. In the past 2 years my love for making jewellery has been rekindled, this time using etched copper and metal clays, so I changed my name to Rowanberry Designs to reflect this new direction. My style has always been pretty much the same whatever medium I have worked with, mixing a love for nature with a love for figurative detail. My biggest change in my creativity was the change from making glass beads purely for people to make jewellery with towards making a bead as a collectable piece of art as itself. Now I approach each bead as if it was a wearable painting or sculpture.

To read the full interview you can purchase our August 2013 Issue here

ThrasionTM - Carved Couture

Ever since the late 80's I have been saving our skateboard decks. Being a skater I know that a skateboard is not just a toy, it holds history and a huge amount of meaning to a skater from the start of the relationship until it breaks. The beauty of my jewellery and accessories is in the thrashed state of the board as every scratch or ding is important.

I am currently supplied with our skateboard decks from skateshops, skateparks, skate companies, pro skaters and friends and family. I only use broken or used skateboards and where the board has come from is part of each product. The decks and wheels are used in their original state and apart from being cut, sanded and finished materials and waste is kept to a minimum.




To read the full article you can purchase our August 2013 Issue here

Gone Fishing!

We often hear people say it when they want to get away from it all. To sit quietly by a riverbank, flask of coffee by your side, sandwiches, crisps and maggots at hand.  Birds singing their sweet songs and dragonflies, dipping and diving across the surface of the water, bliss!
Well, just recently, I have taken up a bit of fishing too.  Not quite the fishing as described above but certainly a kind of fishing.
Lamp work Fishing!
So here I will tell you about a typical lamp work fish production session in The Bead Bounty studio.


To read the full article you can purchase our August 2013 Issue here 

An Interview with Styles of Sonia

Add a little eastern promise to your life with the beautiful creations of Sonia Subash from Styles of Sonia.
Creating from her home in Malaysia Sonia hopes to make the entire world sparkle just that little bit more.
Tell us about yourself Sonia.
I am a proud mother of two boys; one aged thirteen and the second, just about four months old. I have been addicted to making jewelry since a couple of years ago. And it has allowed me to work from home. I am also pursuing a business degree so needless to say, my hands are certainly full and I love it!     

To read the full interview you can purchase our August 2013 Issue here



 







 





   

An Interview with - Chris Parry

 

Interview with - Chris Parry

Published in Issue 23, June 2013

My name is Chris Parry and I am a hubby, father and bespoke jeweller. I changed careerwhen I was 30 and have been making bespoke pieces of jewellery for the last 13  years.

When did you begin and why?  

I fell into my first job, and kept getting promoted. Ten years later at the age of 30, I was good at what I was doing. Well paid for it, but bored to death and didn’t want to carry on in that sector. So I resigned, sold my car and used my savings to put myself through a degree in silversmithing and jewellery design. Whilst at university, you start to look at a way to make a living from the craft. The Internet back in 1999 was very fresh and I happened upon a website www.inspirals.co.uk and thought that I needed my own website to sell my jewellery. I couldn’t afford to employ a website designer, so I bought three books. I read them on the train whilst I commuted to university, and taught myself website design. In 2000, I had my first sale to a guy in Northampton. I started on a homemade jewellers bench in my basement with the spiders. I have since opened two small shops and I just bought my own workshop/shop in the village of South Darenth, Kent.

What is it that you enjoy about your work? I don’t work. It doesn’t feel like work at all. I go to my workshop and make things for people, the day fly’s by and suddenly it’s time to go home.

 What is your biggest achievement?
 I don’t measure success by the big commissions, the value, the corporate order or the celebrity. I measure success by the small things. I got a stunning e-mail form a woman in USA thanking me for making the simplest of rings for her partner 5 years ago. They are still so pleased with them that she felt inclined to drop me an e-mail all these years later. Another lady from Australia lost her brother in a car crash and wanted a ring making with his signature inside. Making commissions like that and hearing what that object means to them is better than any award or big boy order.

Other than crafting, what do you enjoy?
 The small things. Like the ten minute walk to school holding my daughters hand or having a latte with my wife in peace and quiet or telling my 17 year old boy  “I love him” in front of his mates. Opening a pack of bourbon biscuits and laughing out loud, that will make sense later. 

If you had to choose your favourite from your creations?
I am approached by parents who have lost a child. Either in birth or later years. Also by clients who have lost a sibling or a parent. Making something with a hand print, fingerprint or their hand writing is exceptionally rewarding. I can’t pick a favourite, as each story is deeply moving. I suppose the most memorable was the first time, when I made a footprint piece for a lovely lady to remember Frankie. 

What advice would you offer someone starting out?
Don’t chase galleries and shops to sell your wares. Ten years ago, the only way to make a crafting living was to provide multiple retails outlets. Now, with the Internet you can sell as easily to Alaska as you can to Cornwall. It doesn’t suit all crafts as some sell easier online than others. You should however have at least a WowThankYou and Etsy shop, a personal website and a Facebook business page. The Internet has changed how we shop and your location is not a barrier to success. 

 If you could change one thing about what you do what would it be? Facebook is the nightmare. People see a picture and just put in the comment box “OMG that is lovely how much please.” You answer their question, then the next person puts the same question. A lot of my comment threads on facebook, are from people asking the same question. Ahhhhhhhhh. 

 

What has helped your business the most? 

Without doubt the Internet. Within that context, my own website - www.chris-parry.co.uk  Within the last year, my Facebook page. www.Facebook.com/Chris.Parry.Jewellery   

Has any person helped you more than any other? 

More than any person, my supportive and beautiful wife, without whom none of what I have achieved would be possible. She has been the rock. I also have another wonderful woman in my life. Eva approached me five years ago for a job. She had done a night school course and was hooked. She has now worked for me for five years and is my right hand girl. She is very skilled and I wouldn’t swap her for all the tea in China. 

Tell us a random fact about yourself.   When people ask me at a party what I do for a living, I tell them “I’m a biscuit designer, you know the bourbon, that’s one of mine and also the ginger snap.” It amuses me that hundreds of people have told their friends that they met the guy who designed the bourbon.

UPDATE! Since being interviewed by Creative Crafting Chris participated in a Crowd Funded Kickstarter project to raise £47,500. Chris has smashed his total and raised £55.856 which is a record for a craft project on the site!        

 For more info see www.kickstarter.com/projects/291082417/twinkle-twinkle-little-star-bespoke-jewellery 

  Congratulations Chris!