The Jewellery Shed - My New Workplace!

After what felt like weeks of making phone calls to gardeners, electricians, shed people and cladding people my new jewellery shed is at last up and running! I moved in a couple of weeks ago and after a few rearrangements of various tools and other stuff it now feels "right" and I'm settling in and getting to work nicely.

I previously worked on the dining room table and in the kitchen which was ok but obviously meant I was limited in when I could do certain things like soldering and enamelling. I often wished I had a space of my own but it wasn't until another jewellery maker asked if I was interested in renting space in her studio that I thought seriously about having my own little workspace {I can't bring myself to call it a "studio"- it's a shed} The cost to rent a space in someone else's studio and the restricted access that would mean made me think that I could fit a shed in the backyard if the raised bed was removed...... and so the phone calls to various workmen began....

But at last it's done and as you can probably tell I'm so happy about it!! Despite the Swedish sauna pine cladding vibe. I used to imagine how it would feel when I would at last be able sit in my shed with a cup of tea and the radio on and now I can :D

I decided to sand and stain the bench but it didn't turned out how I imagined! I'd spent a day and a half sanding it and thought I'd got all the varnish off it but I hadn't so there's light and dark areas which really bugged me at first but now I don't notice it anymore.

After a long time spent getting stuff out of cupboards then putting it back again the joy of having a space to leave my soldering stuff is immense! I was in the middle of working on a silver hollow form pendant and finishing some copper hollow form earrings when I took this photo. The bench got slightly untidier when I started soldering!

A small fold away table I use for making findings as the height and space on the jewellery bench isn't right for stuff I need to do at normal table height. It took a while to get used to the height of the jewellery bench and I did get neck ache to begin with but now I've got in the swing of it and it is so much better working at that level.

 I made a simple curtain for the window mainly so I could close it at night to stop any opportunist undesirables having a nosy not because I was aiming for the wendy house look. As you can tell from the hand stitching on the hem I won't be sending my application form for the next series of The Great British Sewing Bee off anytime soon :D

I have shelves!

And I can put a few knick knacks on shelves which I like. The wooden boxes are mostly empty as I now have room to put a lot of stuff elsewhere but I do occasionally like to play a  game called "where did I put those .........?" then spend a few minutes opening and shutting every single little box looking for them {and there's another one of those box storage units underneath the table where the rolling mill is}.

 More wooden boxes with "things" in them and a shelf for some more knickknacks and a plant which I just had to have. How it will fare in there during the winter remains to be seen. I dragged my friend round most of the charity shops in town a while ago looking for interesting things and found the two Hornsea pottery striped mugs for £2.99. A bargain and they satisfied my stripe fetish too!

The silver hollow form pendant I've almost finished. The bench peg isn't attached and doesn't fit tightly in the slot on the bench which means I can remove it when necessary which is a good thing sometimes. When I need it to not move I wedge the nail file you can see in this photo down the side of it :D

And finally a very rare photo of me. I don't like having my photo taken and this one is without makeup and possibly a bit too close for comfort!

I'm still tweaking things in the shed as I find better places to keep things. As I work I can see where it would be better for something to live to make the flow of work smoother. I don't like having to scrabble around in a drawer to find a tool when I'm in the middle of something. If a tool has a hanging hole I'll hang it somewhere! 

I still haven't found a home for my pliers which currently hang on one of the drawer handles to the left of where I sit. I do have one of those plastic pliers holders but don't want to lose space on the bench by using it! I have a small metal drawer cabinet on order from Ikea {in red!} which has handles I think I can hang the pliers from. It's to replace the white plastic drawers on the right of the bench which are ok but make the most awful squeal when you open them if you put something too heavy in them. Plus they're plastic and don't go with the wood vibe I have going on :D

No doubt I'll rearrange things a few more times to get it completely right but for now I love it and am so happy when I'm in there ♥

I've really waffled way too much about all this but I hope you've enjoyed the little tour of my work space.

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A Refreshing Break And Some New Jewellery

I recently took a holiday from my online shops for the first time in nearly five years! Yes I actually put my Etsy and Folksy shops and my website in holiday mode for two weeks. And the reason for this? Did I jet off to the Seychelles/take a road trip across the States/ move all my jewellery tools, equipment and "stuff" into what was a garden shed but is now my jewellery workroom? All very exciting options but it was the last one, the other two will just have to wait until my next break in another five years! 

Yes, I now have my own space to work in which is like being in heaven after working on the dining room table and in the kitchen for nearly five years, having to get stuff out and put it away again (then get it out again when I realize I need to do a bit more soldering!) I love my jewellery shed, it's not quite there yet with the organizing and finding homes for everything but it's mine. I'm planning on writing a post about it next week with photos once I've finished the final tweaking.

I did take the opportunity to catch up with making new pieces once I'd moved into the shed as I didn't have to worry about stopping to do findings orders and other things that usually stop me making jewellery. It was lovely actually :D

I used some of the shiny, sparkly cabs and half-drilled pearls I bought from Joopy Gems and made a few pendants and several pairs of earrings...

This is a hollow form pendant I started at jewellery night class. It started life as two different size diameter pieces of copper tube that I added a front and back to and a white pearl cabochon. The etched design was from a really detailed stamp that I wasn't sure would work but it did and I think it's a lovely busy pattern.

I used some silver textured in my rolling mill and added some smooth silver as an overlay with pale pink rose quartz rose cut cabs. I think they look like freaky bugs!

Believe it or not these are the first gemstone studs I've ever made plus a white pearl pair. The labradorite cabs have lovely flashes of green-gold and the peach moonstone are a sweet dot of colour.

These copper post earrings remind me of "spinning jennies" more formally known as the seeds of the ash tree. The green/gold quartz really sparkle in the light. This is the first time I've used posts in a longer style of earring rather than the usual stud style.

 And finally another two hollow form pairs I started at night class. These started life as round copper tube that I shaped using some bezel mandrels I bought a while ago. I always knew I'd find a use for those square/hexagon/triangle mandrels that were part of the set! I turned the square shapes into beads with a hole top and bottom and added them to some copper wire and thin tube to make a pair of twist earrings. The triangles have a leaf vein texture on the front and smooth sides and back. There's something very satisfying about making hollow forms and seeing the transformation from a solder covered piece of metal ( in my case anyway!) to a form that through filing and sanding ends up smooth with a barely visible solder line.

Look out for my post with photos (yay!) of my new workspace coming soon.