Tag: artisan

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Meet the Maker – Beverley from Bevart designs

Meet the maker blog

Beverley Chapelhow – Bevart designs.

I am Beverley, of ‘Bevart designs’ I live in the beautiful Ribble Valley in Lancashire. I will always be that artist that fell into making jewellery making and designing, many people have said that my artwork would make lovely jewellery pieces, this got me thinking and I started to create and work on this possibility. I made a few pieces and put them on display in my studio… to my delight I sold a few, 12 months on I was accepted for a great art and craft show called ‘Art in the Pen’. I took with me my framed artwork and my jewellery, I made more sales than I thought possible. Being encouraged by this I applied to sell on ‘The British Craft House’ and was thrilled to be accepted.

I have always taught art classes to adults sometimes with a crossover into craft making like flower arranging, printmaking, card making etc.

I am inspired to create any art work including my jewellery by nature, the Japanese way of Wabisabi, travel, and other artists, I love the work of Greyson Perry, Yayoi Kusama, there are lots more!

my art studio

I graduated from university in 2008 with a degree in fine art, with a friend and colleague we wanted to still try and work together in a studio environment, we wanted to find a place where we could provide affordable studio space for other artists. I am currently the proud owner of ‘Atelier Arts’ an art studio collective with gallery and teaching space in Clitheroe from here I sell my paintings, I teach art classes to adults including general art and life drawing , I also teach art in Spain with partners ‘Caves of Dreams’  we provide a full all-inclusive art holiday experience in Baza, the region of Andalucia.  

Teaching in Spain

What is the dream? The dream was always to own an art studio, the other is to be selling my work more regularly, whether that’s jewellery or my paintings to build a following and to become successful.

I am currently working from home and we have a workshop in the garage, so I can keep on creating and making.

My proudest moment business wise is owning my current business and that being a success. Forever proud of our two daughters growing into confident, successful, independent women.

My creative future looks like this, over the past year I have been experimenting with ice dyeing and eco printing on fabric. I love textiles and pattern, this is something I want to add to my shop in the future in the form of scarves as I believe this would enhance my jewellery range. I am also planning some Yoga and Art retreats, I want to provide creative relaxing workshops based around self care, using our mental and physical self in a creative way using clay and paint.

To relax and have fun I love to tap dance, I regularly take part in yoga, pilates and meditation. I also love photography and to travel sketch and paint.

I also enjoy a good night out with friends in the city of Manchester drinking cocktails!

I also adore cake, what is my favourite cake ….any cake!!! But very partial to a lemon drizzle

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Hallmarking Jewellery in the UK

Hallmarking in the UK.

Did you know in the UK it is a legal requirement to have certain items hallmarked?

For silver items this legislation applies on any item over 7.78 grams in weight. For gold and palladium the minimum requirement lowers to 1 gram and for platinum its 0.5 grams.

The process of hallmarking involves sending articles to one of 4 assay offices; either London, Sheffield, Birmingham or Edinburgh where the precious metal content is sampled and tested. Assuming the items meet the standard they can then be hallmarked.

London Assay Office StampIn the UK we have one of the strictest systems in the world for testing and quality marking items.  This makes it a fantastic way of guaranteeing the precious metal item you are purchasing is indeed what you believe it to be.

The process of regulating the purity of metals began in 1238 and was progressed further in 1363 when King Edward III decreed all precious metal items were to be tested and marked for purity and that this also had to include a makers mark. It is amazing to be part of such a long standing tradition.

A hallmark consists of various stamps including symbols to indicate where the piece was tested, its purity and the personalised stamp of the maker. Optional stamps include a date stamp to indicate when the piece was made, and fineness stamps to show the metals purity.

Laura Llewellyn Design HallmarkI am proud to have my hallmark registered with the London Assay office and to have my work checked here.  My makers mark is an oval shaped stamp with the initials LJG; the G is from my maiden name. Each person or company’s stamp is unique so the maker of a piece can be identified.

Hallmarking is a costly process. Therefore I don’t tend to have smaller items which are under the threshold hallmarked as the costs would escalate. If however you would like an item to be hallmarked which doesn’t currently display one please get in touch to discuss the options.

I have included the official dealers notice below so you can see the different marks that can be applied and perhaps identify some on a piece of jewellery?!

I hope you have found this article of interest.  Please get in touch with any questions or leave a comment below.

Laura x

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Fused Glass Pebbles of Swirling Colour

I’ve recently been making glass ‘pebbles’ in my studio to try and get my creative juices flowing again. The Covid 19 lock down has left me strangely stumped at times, almost as if having so much unplanned time on my hands has slowed me down. I would wander into my studio and fiddle around tidying my sheets of glass, ordering them by colour and size but couldn’t get stuck in to anything constructive.

So I decided to make some puddles. This is a fun technique where you place a stack of different coloured equally sized glass pieces together and fuse them. The layers fuse together into a solid lump. Then the fun starts! Using a hammer and tile cutters you break the piece into smaller bits, exposing the striped layers of colour. These smaller chunks are then fused again with the layers upright. 

The result is lovely rounded pebbles of swirling colours, I love just running them through my fingers!

I’m now thinking of what to do with them. Some will be pendents and some I will incorporate into other projects.

Thank goodness, I’ve got my mojo back!

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Summer is coming ….maybe

Unprecedented times, furlough, words about 8 weeks ago we had never considered to be part of our everyday life, supermarket queues, the world taking up baking leading to an unnormally high demand for flour of all varieties.

It has amazed me the number of people who have decided to take up gardening, me included! I currently have various ? salad leaves, radish, basil, peppers, mustard, plus some forget-me-nots and pansies popping up … it is also great for home schooling (I am not good at being a teacher, I get too ratty far too quickly, but I think that is because my little darlings know how to annoy me in the hopes I give up and they can drift back to the various game machines they have) but at least one them has been very involved in preparing, planting, and watering so I will take that as a small win 🙂

Grey Metal Planted Planter
Grey Metal Planted Planter
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2 year old smile ….

Today, Easter Monday I received a message via the other side beginning with E and ending in Y … from a lovely customer who, 2 years ago ordered some bespoke planters, they took some time to make, I never heard back so wasn’t sure she was happy or not, however I wasn’t fazed as in my experience most people forget to leave good feedback, rarely do they forget to leave feedback for a negative experience, many tell the world so I assumed all was good. 

Fast forward 2 years, to a chilled Easter Monday, and this lovely lady, Sarah, messaged me simply to say, she tried to leave feedback but couldn’t see how to do it, the remainder of her message is below (I did ask permission to post) 

“They look really fantastic, we look like we have a wildly expensive landscaped garden at a fraction of the cost!” “2 years in and these still look new. Thank you so much we are really pleased” 

So there you have it, Sarah G 2 years on and still her planters look like new. 

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Featured Artist!

It is well known that many artists and crafts people often struggle with self- esteem and find it difficult to acknowledge their own talent. It can be daunting to put your work out in the public domain. When there is so much time and passion invested in carefully crafted pieces, it can feel as if you are baring your soul for scrutiny.

 

If, like me, you have no formal artistic training and are completely self taught, feeling your way, experimenting and exploring techniques as you go, it is easy to feel a bit like a fraud amongst other talented makers and artists.  

 

It takes time to build confidence and just one positive comment can make you feel ten feet tall.  

 

So it was in a bit of a mad moment that I applied to be a featured artist with World of Wool. I didn’t really give myself time to talk myself out of it, I just filled out my details and sent off the form!

 

The site regularly features a variety of makers and their gallery is full of seriously talented textile artists, including the fabulous Moy Mackay.

 

Imagine my surprise when I received an email two days later telling me they would like to feature me in their latest monthly blog and newsletter! 

 

I was beyond excited and thrilled to think that an organization was interested in my work and prepared to feature it and share it with thousands of their subscribers.

 

This morning when I opened my email, there it was!  A copy of the article and my  face staring back at me from the World of Wool newsletter.  It feels amazing to have my work acknowledged and it has given me such a confidence boost, just when I needed it.

 

I started to get feedback on my social media pages almost instantly, lots of congratulations and support from followers and fellow artisans.  There was one comment, however, that really made my day, from a lady I hadn’t heard from before and this is what she wrote:

 

‘And that’s how I came across you. You’re work is beautiful and inspiring. I had lost my mojo a bit with felting even though had just recieved a big order from world of wool. You’ve made me want to get felting again ❤️’

 

 

What a wonderful, uplifting comment, how fantastic that someone would take time out of their day to say that in response to my post.  She had read the article from her inbox first thing and by the time I had shared the article on social media, she had already looked me up and was engaging with my thread. It was incredible to think that my work had helped to reignite another artist’s passion. 

 

So thank you World of Wool for accepting my application, thank you Andrew Novotny for such a great write up and thank you to each and every one of you who read the article and left some feedback on my social media pages, it really means a great deal.  

 

Please continue to support small business where you can, it’s hard work to find recognition but I am delighted to tell you that I did a little happy dance all the way to my studio this morning! 

 

If you woud like to read the article , please visit: 

https://www.worldofwool.co.uk/apps/base/blog/featured-artist-louise-hancox

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Winter is slowing creeping away as Spring gathers pace

I have to confess the weather of  late has been confusing, from a cloud burst of snow one afternoon, clear blue skies followed less than 24 hours later, chasing its tail the howling gales and flash floods across the country, it’s cold enough to be winter, but the bright blue skies suggest a different story. 
So what plants, bulbs, or seedlings can you realistically look at panting whilst the weather is so up and down? 

To answer this question it does also depend on a many other factors, including but not limited too the PH levels of your soil, whether you live in a sheltered area or are fully exposed on a cliff top , availability of a greenhouse or somewhere light warm and airy, essentially draught free to give a few answers. 
February gardening is all about getting the seeds planted, so get out your old planters and scrape off the top layer of compost and replace with fresh. Seed wise you can sow lettuces in readiness for fresh leaves in May June time, but do ensure they are protected, varieties such as Winter Gem, and Valdor are good winter hardy types but do make sure you plant under cloches

As a general rule, bulbs can be planted out as well, but do remember they tend to prefer light well draining soil, if they are left in wet, heavy soil they are unlikely to thrive. So you can consider broad beans, carrots, parsnips, beetroot, cabbages. 
If you are lucky enough to have a greenhouse herb seeds, tomatoes, cucumber can get a good start. 

I have started to list a few deeper, larger metal garden planters, these were specifically designed to enable the rooftop or patio gardener to have access to deeper soil thus enabling root vegetables to be sown. grown and eaten from the single metal garden planter. So if you fancy one do let me know! 
Fi

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Meet the Sellers x 3!

 

Team TBCH South East Cornwall Meetup – meet Halyey, Buffy & Chris

 

Written by Buffy…who is The Twisted Felter

So earlier today I met up for brunch with the lovely Hayley aka The Northern Smuggler and Chris The Chris Artist. Chris paints beautiful artwork from the surrounding areas and Hayley creates fabulous Resin artwork and jewellery inspired by the local Cornish Coast. Luckily Chris had chosen the best café (award winning @olivecocafe thankyou…delish!) and so I turned up to meet 2 complete strangers thinking I should have worn a rose in my lapel?! Sadly I was lapel-less so I took a chance and sidled up to a random man sitting on his own who fortunately turned out to be Chris and Hayley joined us soon after.

My brain is a busy one so I had brought along a list of things I wanted to ask (I feel like a bit of a duffer with the whole online selling and social media stuff as I’m new to the game) and was pleasantly surprised that they too had the same questions and doubts. As Hayley put it ‘Fake it ’til you Make it’. Although Hayley was not giving herself credit as she had lots of  great media tips and advice and has her own professional branding which looks fab. Chris is already self employed so gave me good advice around tax returns, a boring but necessary part of it all. It was sound advice…pay an accountant!!

We chatted about The British Craft House website and how we were finding navigating our way around. We wondered when Dottie (our Illustrious Leader, advice giver, encouragement officer and all round good egg) EVER SLEEPS?!? She seems to be sending encouraging posts in the middle of the night!

We talked about how isolating working alone and from home can be sometimes and how fab it was to meet up with the real people behind our sellers names. We shared contacts for work in the local area, craft initiatives,the best Apps, training days, ideas for display and presentation, photography and we laughed at ourselves a fair bit. We talked about the insecurities of seeing the imperfections in our work and whether they are good enough to sell, the vulnerability of putting your work out there in front of people, the difficulty of feeling comfortable promoting (non-stop!) yourself online. And we arranged to meet again of course.

So this is my first blog. I’ve no idea whether it’s good. Or not. But I’m venturing right out of my comfort zone writing it AND putting a photo of myself online. That’s how rock and roll I am today. I’m a blogger. Boom!

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Traditional V Digital Sculpture techniques?

I’ve been a traditional sculptor for more than 30 years. I enjoy the relationship I have with the medium I use, and also the close interaction with the reference materials I choose, both of which combine to help me create the sculptures I produce.

Close up of a Hare sculpture created using traditional sculpting techniques
Close up of my Harriet Hare sculpture created using traditional sculpting techniques

I am rather resistant to change, and have tended to view ‘digital’ sculpting as… cheating! Well, to some degree any way! However, a figurine designing company recently contacted me after they began following me on Instagram and they commented that they were impressed by my ‘sensational fur sculpting skills’! (?) They went on to ask me to sculpt a type of Tiger for them, even though they employ several digital sculptors. It seems that perhaps fur can’t easily be replicated using a computer and that the hand and eye of a traditional sculptor might still be useful in this digital age! 

I was thinking about how I was going to approach this project and I had an idea about how to incorporate working ‘with’ digital sculptors which would save the company time and money and still produce the finish on the sculpture which they came to me for.

I admit to feeling slightly apprehensive when I emailed them my idea… I know nothing about digital sculpting or 3D printing and was expecting my idea to be shot down in flames, but… the reply came back almost immediately hailing me as ‘innovative’ and a ‘genius’! (?) They also believe that they might have quite a bit of ‘traditional’ sculpting work for me in the future! 

So, traditional V Digital Sculpture techniques? You’ll have noticed that I haven’t spilled the beans on exactly ‘what’ my brilliant idea is (it isn’t always a good idea to give your best ideas away!), but I’m so pleased that after my resistance to digital sculpting I have found a way to combine it with the way I work to the mutual benefit of both me and the customer in a faster and ultimately a more satisfactory way. 

Hare sculpture created using traditional sculpting techniques
My Harriet Hare sculpture created in wax using traditional sculpting techniques
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MERRY CHRISTMAS with love from JOYsofGLASS XX

An Enormous Thank you to Dottie for setting up this wonderful Handmade British site for artisans and artists and craftsmen (should that be craftspeople ?  ?). 

Thank you also to all those who have visited my Joysofglass shop and stopped to browse and even to buy.  I do hope you have enjoyed what you have seen and look forward to seeing you again soon. 

The British Craft House has not been here long, less than 2 momths, but it’s been blooming fantastic so far.
Onwards and Upwards for 2020.