Each collection starts life as a spark of an idea in a sketchbook or the inspiration begins from my travels or refelecting on the world around us. This is the story behind our popular Botanica range of jewellery.
SEED OF THE IDEA
I love to be surrounded by nature in my life, whether by the collection of plants in my home, walks in the countryside around our design headquarters, or out on travels. In recent times we’ve visited so many botanical locations for photography shoots for our jewellery as the colours of nature always look so beautiful as a backdrop. One that stands out was the hidden gem Hunte’s Gardens in Barbados (created in the 50’s by horticulturist Anthony Hunte) The place is truly amazing, filled with exotic plants and trees I’ve never seen before. We couldn’t resist when invited to the balcony by Anthony himself for a break with rum tasting (some of the best rum ever tried and stories about how he started the garden) It was like being in a treehouse with a perfect birdseye view of the variety of plants and I returned to our villa that night to sketch, getting down on paper ideas sparked by the botanicals around us during the day. This was the starting point of the collection which grew from there when we returned to England.
REFLECTION OF SHAPES IN NATURE
As I worked through the collection developing ideas I used the shapes in nature to create the jewllery pieces. Some are abstract like the interconnecting spirals used in the Native and Wild Jasmine earrings inspired by the twisting tree trunks and vines in the gardens or the abstract leaf shapes in the Green Tea and Hibiscus jewellery sets.
Many though we developed to be more exact representations of flowers and leaves like the Fern ring and bracelet or the Bloom earrings.
GEMSTONES TO REFLECT THE NATURAL WORLD
We were careful to select gemstones which would work within the collection to really show the colours of nature. I knew weI needed to use Labradorite and Green Aventurine for the vibrant greens of the botanical world, but it took longer to find the rare Prehnite for the bright acid green I wanted and the warm Orange Aventurine for the colours of nature in Autumn.
We also used Green Jade for the opaque colour tone we wanted to capture and made sure we flat cut some of the Labradorite for the Palm set as this shows the veining patterns of the gemstone which looks like the natural patterns you see on leaves and plant stems.
PRECIOUS METALS – TEXTURES AND TECHNIQUES
This collection was an oportunity to use different metal work finishes and techniques to achieve the look we wanted. We worked with using gold and silver together in stark combination in designs such as Calla and Fleur for striking effect and to make the centre of the floral designs stand out. As well as using high shine finish against the softer toned gemstones we also worked with brushed and fine patterned finishes to refelect the textures in nature such as the matt veined effect on the Verbena and Sycamore earrings and the fine criss cross of the Citron and Laurel pieces.
We hope you enjoy exploring the collection as much as we loved the journey of designing it!