Made in Clerkenwell - Craft Central Open Studios
Clerkenwell / Farringdon, London 
11-14 May 2017

I am excited again be taking part in Made in Clerkenwell from my studio in Craft Central, opening my workshop to visitors and exhibiting my latest work.

Unfortunately due to other commitments I won't be able to be open for the whole weekend, but I WILL be open to visitors for the day and evening on Friday 12 May - do come by and see my new work if you're near the area! I am in studio 36 (third floor) in the St Johns Square building.

There will as usual be an amazing selection of artists, craftspeople and designers all exhibiting over the two Craft Central buildings and the three gallery spaces, so the event is always well worth a visit! Come along to browse for inspiration, to shop for unique handmade gifts, or to hunt down a summer treat for yourself....

To register for free entry to the event - do go to - https://www.craftcentral.org.uk/news/made-clerkenwell-spring-2017

This is likely to be the last Made in Clerkenwell event that I am part of, due to various upcoming changes, but I hope you'll be able to join me on Friday 11 May for what promises to be another exciting event.

I teach a range of jewellery making short courses in my central London workshop - this month I would like to share more about the soapstone carving course I offer.

This course next runs on Sunday 30 April and then on Saturday 17 June and the day costs £130 per person, to create your own unique carved and polished stone pendant or individual paperweight.

During the day we will look at blocking out and planning a design, using simple hand tools to create your chosen design, and then smoothing and polishing your carved surface if desired.

Soapstone is a particularly soft stone - because it is soft and easy to work, it was one of the first materials carved to make decorative items by our distant ancestors, and has continued to be carved right to today - to carve it, all you need are hand tools such as files and drills.

The stone has a gorgeous tactile quality and creates beautiful sculptures - it can be polished smooth, or you can create surface textures or patterns. This day is a creative day exploring shapes and using the soapstone to experiment with the process of sculpting.

If you'd like to have a go at exploring your creative side and creating your own stone sculpture - do get in touch! Places can be booked here - http://www.pennyakester.co.uk/store/p46/Carved_Soapstone_Pendants_-_One_Day_Jewellery_Making_Class.html, or do get in touch if you have any questions about the day!

*** THIS IS NOT A LAPIDARY COURSE and these skills are not directly transferable to working with precious or semiprecious gemstones as these are much harder and require different equipment to shape them.

Here are the results of my third month of a pattern a day...

For March, I decided to make each pattern one that I had created completely myself - so here are my sketches, doodles and drawings as my pattern inspirations! I wanted to change from photos for a month and experiment with different super quick drawing methods. I had great fun working on these and some of them are definitely going to progress into jewellery designs or surface patterns.

I'd love to see some of your design inspirations - do share your ideas here, or tag #patternaday on Instagram if you'd like to join in the fun!

Well I love my tools, and I often get questions from students about different tools, so I thought i could share some here.

The next key jewellery making tool I'd like to feature is the humble baby wipe. Not exactly a traditional jewellers tool, but for me this is another key one!

A Baby Wipe - How does it help?
Well I realise these are not automatically thought of as jewellers tool, but this is something I am never without when working!

I do primarily use this when working with metal clay, but they come in handy at all sorts of times. Mostly for cleaning up, but cleaning up can be key in an active and busy working space!

Baby wipes when used with metal clay are a great help - being both moist and a fine woven cloth. Used on wet or dry clay, they can be used to smooth and refine edges, as well as to soften forms and even get rid of fine surface cracks and marks.

By gently massaging or stroking the clay surface with the baby wipe, the clay is moistened and can be gradually moved by further stroking - either continuing with the baby wipe, or alternative baby wipe and a damp finger. I love this way of working as it allows a lot of working directly with the hands and fingertips on the clay, to do the same job that filing or sanding would do on sheet metal.

Baby wipes are great for cleaning up - if you've been using messy equipment - polishing, or using paints, chemicals, solvents - they don't disintegrate as quickly as tissues and they are great for wiping down surfaces!

Use them as they are for minor cleaning, or add acetone (or other chemicals relevant to your spills) to clean more severe problems such as cleaning up glues, resin spills, etching resists and conductive paint for electroforming.

The images below show some dry metal clay elements both before and then after working with baby wipes.

Finally no - it doesn't seem to matter about the brand of wipe! For metal clay work, some leave more hairy fibres behind than others, but they all do the same great job. If you use enough wipes - collect them up in a bin bag and send them in with your metal reclaim - the clay wiped into them is all silver, and doesn't need to be thrown away - the wipes can be incinerated and the metal collected up!

Have you got any other key (jewellery related) uses for your baby wipes that you'd like to share?!

I teach a range of jewellery making short courses in my central London workshop - this month I would like to share more about the electroforming course I offer.

This course is running next on the 6 & 7 April 2017, and then again on the 9 & 10 June. The course costs £210 for the 2 day course and this includes all materials.

What is electroforming?
Electroforming is a way of depositing metal particles onto the surface of another item. The process can be used to either entirely coat a master model (eg a wax carving) to create a strong but lightweight metal form (allowing larger scale work than would be practical to cast in solid metal for example), or to add metal highlights onto a non-metallic object.

In my work as an artist / designer, I use electroforming to add contrasting elements, to add metal forms into designs that use other materials as well. For example; I create metal highlights onto hand carved stones, I use electroforming to combine with beadwork or to blend and hold a stone into place on a fabricated metal form.

In this course we will be working with copper - growing copper onto non-metallic objects such as stones, leaves, twigs, glass, ceramic items, gems, and more.

What does the course cover?
The first morning covers preparation and setup -
We start the course with how to prepare objects for electroforming, using sealants and then conductive paints, safe use of these and the key practical considerations for the most successful results.
Once the pieces are prepared, we cover setting up a simple, basic kit that is practical and affordable for electroforming at home or in a small workshop.
The course then takes a break, I run the tanks and check on them every hour over the afternoon and the next morning. It takes a while to grow a substantial layer of metal, so the class continues on the afternoon of the second day.
On the second day we cover working with the completed pieces plus kit storage and maintenance -
We start by going over all the pieces that have been formed - what worked best, what might not have worked so well, and what could have caused this / how to improve it.
We look at refining, finishing and using the formed pieces - what can and can't easily be done with them.
We also cover how to safely store the chemicals and kit and how to maintain the liquid and materials for future use.