Autumn Studio Party

Autumn Studio Party

Autumn Studio Party

WED 25TH September, 5-8pm.

The perfect time to talk about commissions and special gifts for later in the year.

Join us for nibbles and drinks 🥂

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It’s not easy being green

It’s not easy being green

It’s August – that means a new birthstone! This time it’s the turn of peridot – which we’ve found has never been one of our best sellers. We think this is such a shame as we love its gorgeous green colour, however we know that like yellow it can be a difficult colour to wear. Like kermit the frog and Elphaba the witch, it seems it’s not easy being green.

 

Disco Earrings
Disco Earrings

It hasn’t alway been this way. The Egyptians LOVED green gemstones including peridot. Green was often associated with being wealthy – the Arnolfini portrait by Jan Van Eyk (pictured above) is all about this. That dress would not only have been completely lined with artic fox fur (really not ethical by todays standards), but made from highly expensive wool that was dyed a bold green – which was super expensive and laborious to create ( and involved working with lots of aged sheep wee yuck) .

Trends always seem to come around again – we’ve been seeing more of the colours that were considered difficult again –  it’s all about dopamine dressing – the practice of wearing colours that make you happy. Green is just perfect for that – it’s found everywhere in the natural world. Being out in nature is proven to boost your mood for hours after you’ve gone back inside. So we think it’s time to add a bit more green into our wardrobes.

A Taste of Spring

A Taste of Spring

A Taste of Spring by Athene Sholl 
The rain and hail has finally stopped, possibly just for a few hours – who knows? We even saw just a hint of a pink sunset last night. And the birds tweeted, very very faintly – just for a short while. Spring is on the way…
It really did feel like a sign that light was at the end of the tunnel. But of course we have still have 2 more loooooong weeks of January to get through yet. And then February – sigh. And then the weather will be up and down a million times, teasing us with hints of light and warmth. Then will come the fool’s spring, when cardigans will be cast aside, and sweaters packed away, in false hope, before winter descends again, like a shroud. To catch us all out. Then come the spring coughs and colds as the lymph changes direction and makes us all feel wrong. Rinse and repeat throughout March, and then suddenly – there we are in actual real live spring, birds singing, sun on our faces, clocks changing and we really feel alive again.
But we don’t have to wait until then – grab a slice of spring from our necklace selection. These gorgeous pieces were on display at the Coach House Gallery – and due to the gallery closing this week, (another sigh) we’ve got them lined up in the studio for you, Just when we all need a boost. Ping us a message if one takes your fancy
Athene xxx

Greenery

Greenery ,the colour de jour – there’s always one nowadays. It’s simply inescapable. We can’t just wear what suits us anymore, we have to wear this year’s latest colour. How has this happened to us again? I thought, as a society that we’d outgrown the fashion rules about prescribed colours passed down from on high from the fashion powers that be. It’s not the fifties any more! Surely we can wear what we like and be who we like?

And of course we can, there are no actual rules anymore. But here we have a colour that is so incredibly all pervasive it feels like someone had written some new secret rules and passed them around when I wasn’t looking.

 

It’s not even green any more for godsake, it’s “Greenery”. How did the power of collective brainwashing commonly known as the media, manage to create this in my head? It’s just a colour, it’s only a colour. IT’S SIMPLY A COLOUR. And not even a nice one, it’s green, what’s all the fuss about? Colour of school uniforms across the country, naff carpeting in run down buildings, shoddy 70’s cars, all the stuff that has never been cool, at least not in my lifetime. But when I look out of my workshop window onto my garden in April and see the myriad of shades, all green, all different yet complementary. I get it. New life…promise…hope even. Again that warmth in my chest, a deep breath, an elated feeling, a realisation (My god, get a grip, it’s just a colour) that we’re on the edge of something amazing. We’re just about to blossom into a new season and feel the benefit of spring. An excitement, an expectation, but with it also a calmness and a knowing that all will be fine, what will be will be. There’s an almost religious acceptance – and this from a deeply non- religious person – of the infallible turning of the earth, of Karma, an acceptance of the cycle of life, (rather than the Disney version, the circle of life) and proof of it’s existence and benefit and standing above all else in the world.

greenary chalcedony colour theory necklace

That’s what they’re selling with this colour – LIFE, GROWTH, NEWNESS… And then it really dawns on me…I’ve always loved green, the colour of the leaves, the grass, the new growth. I’ve just never considered it as a fashion shade, and yet here we are. Like the New Look tag line says “It’s all about Newness”. Aren’t they clever, the fashion industry, the pantone people, the interior people, to have re programmed my head again somehow, to make this colour so desirable? Rebadged, repackaged, just like it is each and every single year in the spring time, and we just let it grow anew each year without even considering it as a fashion colour. And when was the last time we had green interiors? Dark Regency green maybe? Seriously, we even bypassed green in the seventies, it’s not that pretty a colour surely? Maybe there was a bit of green nylon about on the odd sixties day dress, but nothing to write home about. But this is so fresh, and so new, wow that’s an impressive feat, to make something so ubiquitous as the colour of the first spring leaves into a fashion statement.

Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you “Greenery” – that never before seen shade.

Except for every time you’ve ever seen a tree. Or a hedge. Or some grass.

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