London Jewellery School Business Day Class

Ok, so yesterday I went to a Business Day Class at the London Jewellery School!  And the first thing I will say is that I can definately recomment it to anyone who is thinking about starting a Jewellery Business.

For me, I kind of knew half the stuff which we talked about as I have been reading up and researching this for a few months now - things like PR, Advertising and Marketing stuffm Packaging, Pricing jewellery, IT, Websites, Networking and Craft shows.  But there were also very useful nuggets of information which will definately come in use for me, as I feel there are always at least a few things which aren't ALWAYS mentioned in books and other websites which have this sort of information on.

What was also very useful for me was the first part where we focused on our strengths and weaknesses, VERY useful information about hallmarking, how to get into galleries and shops and what to expect when you do decide to try, including the legal side of things and how to draw up an order form and a document of "Terms of Trade" which can be used as a legally binding document.  I also found it VERY useful to find out abou legal requirements and insurance stuff - this bit usually fills my head with candy floss and I get very confused....I swear all this legal stuff is purposefully made to be hard to understand to prevent people from wanting to run their own business!  Seriously - some of this stuff is enough to put some people off even starting...!!

Anyway, the best things about this class was that it was small - only 8 other people were in the group, which meant that the entire days' discussions could be focused on what WE wanted to know and learn. Like me, with all the legal stuff, and others who wanted to know more about being at craft shows, selling to galleries and doing commissions.  I also felt that the entire class was quite informal, fun, and it was nice to be with other people who had the same sort of interests and ambitions, and that our ideas were so different from one anothers.  It was a really good place to share ideas, advice and knowledge, and I have to say the teacher was very approachable and experienced in running a business herself - I always find it better for someone experienced to teach something that they know a lot about, rather than having a list of stuff and a random person just talking at you all day.

Sorry there are no photos in this post, but I just wanted to say that I really enjoyed the Jewellery Business Day at the London Jewellery School, I recommend it to anyone who is thinking of starting a jewellery business, and it has got me thinking of several things which I need to look at before I even start selling my jewellery...!!  Hopefully we're all going to keep in contact and share our shops and websites - I'm afraid I only have my blog to offer at the moment as my website is not ready, and neither is my shop!  I will be ready in the middle - end of August which isn't too far away, but I will be blogging when everything is up and running, I promise :)

With the website, I have to re-arrange a few things and put my photos up, and I need to wait for my business cards which - I know I took all those photos in time for the 30% discount but it turns out that there is something which I put on the cards which at the Business Day Class we were advised not to do....!!  I have contacted the company to find out if I can cancel and start over - and that's another thing: I need to amend my business card design!

So there are a few things I need to do before launching this business of mine, but I will get there in the end!

A very productive week!

I know I know...I meant to blog last Wednesday LOL!  Actually last week was pretty busy for me.  Wednesday I went to a book launch, had a vaccination booster jab and I was creating jewellery like crazy!

So here is what happaned - last weekend I checked my email and found one from www.moo.com - this is where I have ordered my stickers from to put on my jewellery boxes topersonalise them and I think moo.com are brilliant!  Anyway, this email said that they were doing a 30% of EVERYTHING they printed until Thursday midnight last week.  When I opened the email, this gave me 4 days to make enough jewellery so I could put photos of my work on the reverse of the business cards I had designed!  Yey!

So, Monday through to Wednesday I was creating goodness knows how many necklaces, and on Thursday I spent the day taking lots and lots of photos of them.  I filled my camera with 480 photos!  Wow.  Anyway, Everything turned out really well apart from a few photos of the necklaces on the busts with turned out darker than I would have liked.  Still, it was the close up photos which I was going to use to put on the business cards, and with a little tewaking of the OTHER side of the business card, I managed to put my order in and sort it all out by 9pm Thursday evening and I got 30% my order of 200 mini cards.  Phew!

So you see, it really has been a busy week but I'm glad it happened.  I had a deadline so I made jewellery like crazy.  This doesn't mean I'm not going to make much jewellery this week - last week sort of threw me into it and I feel like I have a flow going, and I'm ready to play around with more designs.  I am still planning on begining to launch everything mid - late August, but something else may come up before then which may delay it a week.  It's all got to do with a friend in the States and the issue of shipping her cat over to her by September 1st....but I won't go into that LOL!

Anyway, everything is pretty much on schedule, and this Wednesday I am going to the London Jewellery School for a "Business Day" class - I really hope it's going to be helpful and not repeat everything I've already read about!  I'm looking forward to it actually.  I just need to print out a map to find out where everything is and I'll be fine.  Also hoping there might be a Starbucks close by so I can have some lunch there :)  I shall write about it in my next post :)

Sneek Peeks on experimental jewellery making!

Well this week has been quite productive for me, I must say.  Productive in two senses - I have been discovering what I can and can't do, and I have actually made some jewellery!  I have been playing around with beads which I may or may not sell online and perhaps keep them for potential craft fairs.  I'm not sure, we'll see.

Anyway, I had lots of teeny tiny seed beads which I thought I would use to try my hand at bead sewing and weaving.  I tried a few things and actually found the process...not difficult as such but incredibly time consuming.  I know people who do this all the time can do it really fast, but the smallest thing took me 40 minutes to make and realistically, I thought perhaps this wasn't such a good idea!  I did make two charms which could be put onto a keychain though!  I decided to keep some beads and pack others into small bags.  I gave them to my boyfriend who took them to work where his colleague's 10 year old daughter apparently squealed with delight upon receiving more beads!  She's obviously better suited to this bead weaving lark than I am!

Other techniques which I tried and decided were not for me included wire crochet and wire knitting.  As great as it looks, I found these really difficult...and painful on the fingers...!  However, I continued making things and trying things out - I tried crocheting cord with the larger seed beads which looked allright, I have to admit.  I also tried macrame, which I remember doing a bit of at school and not too long ago - I just had to remember which cords went where and I was off!  Macrame doesn't take me too long - nowhere near as long as beadweaving anyway - so this might be something I could use with the remaining non-gemstones which I have in my collection.  Something which I was successful with was creating a few necklaces with some wooden beads, some of which a friend had given me before she move to the States (Thankyou Liv!), which included a HUGE pendant which I ended up making an improvised bail for.  No really, it was a case of threading the wire through the hole and thinking "Oh. What now?" - I had not thought it through but it turned out good in the end.  I thought copper worked well with the rest of the necklace.

The next thing I did was a bit of wire-wrapping.  A while ago I had won some large wooden beads in a little magazine competition (I love beads. ANY beads. A competition to win some is something I cannot ignore, regardless of what beads there are...!!!).  They were plain and black, and I had NO idea what to do with them.  Fortunately, I had kept many blog posts from other people online who make jewellery and as I was going through them wondering what on EARTH to do with these plain wooden beads, I came across a tutorial for wire-wrapping sea-glass.  I didn't look at the tutorial at all - I saw the photos.  I tried it with copper wire and the result was very pleasing!!

I have to admit that I have tried wire-wrapping before and I dont' have any luck with non-drilled beads.  I personally find it so much easier to have a drilled bead (like these wooden ones here), so I can create a bail at the top, take the wire through the drilled hole, and wrap it around the bead that way.  Yet another thing discovered. I really enjoyed creating these actually, and I honestly think the copper wire works REALLY well with the black wood.  I think silver would also have worked well but these were meant to be practice pieces which I am now keeping as is.  Trouble is....I want more of these wooden beads to wire wrap and I have NO idea where to get some from LOL!  I'm sure I will find some eventually.

Anyway, this is what I have been up to as of late, and next week I hope to have some photos of some gemstone beaded jewellery which I have been making in order to sell online.  Well, maybe it'll be another "sneek peek" as I'm not putting them up yet - I'm building up stock in preparation to "launch" my shop on Etsy! :)

Green, grey and fuzzy!

Yes, it's another scarf - as I said, I am making rather a few this year for Christmas!  This one is another simple double rib scarf like the last one, but the wool is different.  This is a sage-green wool with blue spots called "Wendy Mistral Chinky", and is a very similar wool to the grey one I knitted AGES ago.  This wool is 29% wool, 68% acrylic and 3% polyester, and I used 6.5mm needles to knit.  I am very pleased with this scarf, it's a little bobbly in texture, but the wool is quite wavy.  I added tassles as I did for the other one - actually I find tassles very therapeutic to do LOL!

Anyway, I would say who this is for but he might be reading this blog so I'll just say it's a gent's scarf....and no, it's not for the model in the photo - my boyfriend!  He's not really a scarf person, but he wanted the grey scarf I mentioned earlier.  Actually, speaking of that grey scarf - I actually knitted a hat for him to match, which was my first time using circular needles, using the same rib stitch as the scarf.  In all honesty I'm not really a huge fan of circular knitting needles, it kind of irritates me having to push the wool around constantly!  But I think I ended up with a nice hat.  I have tried crocheting hats but it doesn't really seem to happen for me!  I'll be posting a few of my crochet results at some point - the successful ones of course!

Lastly, regarding the beads - I have began to play with seed beads and bead stitching and weaving.  It's nice to do, but for me as an inexperienced person at this particular craft, it does take me quite a long time.  I kept imagining how long people take to make those huge necklaces with all that intricate bead weaving!!  Anyway, the point of doing it is part of my voyage of creative discovery, and I think I have to say that bead weaving and stitching is not really for me.  But I tried it - and this is what I'm figuring out!  I'll get on to the gemstone jewellery soon, I know I will! :)