We're Getting Creative

Hello All,

Welcome back!

Here at the Amethyst studio we are once again putting our thinking caps on, designing and creating new pieces.

Sara has been hard at work making new sparkly jewellery creations using her beautiful wire wrapping technique - the new rings she has made are just fabulous - See below -  and pre sale orders have flooded in. We soon hope to have these available through our Misi store - the link for the shop is found at the side of the main blog posts but you can click HERE for a quick link too.

Wire Wrapped necklaces by Sara Young 2014

 

These pieces will look stunning with summer wear, evening wear, party wear - you name it! 

Wire wrapped ring by Sara Young 2014

This ring is one of several new creations, pre orders are coming in thick and fast! 




Our focus at the moment is on getting new summer stock ready for the Milton Keynes Museum Children and Families weekend which is being held on 14th and 15th June this year.


The Children's Literature/ fairy tale theme is a great excuse to make some fabulous costume pieces and for Paula to get in touch with her inner child and create some themed art pieces too

This piece - The Queen of Hearts is being considered for producing as prints -

Would you like to see this produced as a print? - let us know. 

we welcome any feedback you might like to give us about these ideas, so please feel free to leave us a comment or get in touch with us via the store if you have any requests.




We will have a stall at the event, which Sara and Paula are organising through our sister company Cerulean Sky Ltd, Stall holder enquiries are welcome!)  we would love to see you there so come and introduce yourself - we would love to meet you :)

Until next time..

The Amethyst Team x

Bletchley Park Event Round-up, and Cause for Congratulations!

Photograph By Paula Harris. August 2013

Hello All,

We hope you have all had a fabulous Summer, and enjoyed the intermittent sun as much as possible. We are all keeping our fingers crossed that it's not quite over yet!

We would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone who attended, participated in and helped with the Bletchley Park 'Summer on the Lawn' event. It was a huge success and the majority of the feedback we have had has been extremely positive. The wheels are already in motion to get organised for next year and we hope to see an even better turn out next Summer.

We are still awaiting the final figures for the amount of money raised for and donated to The Bletchley Park Trust and Open Door charities through attendance and participation in the event - we will update you when we get this information.

We would also like to congratulate our clients Jules and Myles Cooper on their recent wedding!

The happy couple were married on August 31st 2013, and Amethyst Sky was privileged to be commissioned to create the bride's bouquet, posies, corsages and button holes, and even a topper for their wedding cake!

The Bride was keen to have something bespoke and beautiful for herself and her wedding party, and after some initial consultations Sara Young designed these fabulous arrangements:

Bouquets, Posies, Button holes and
corsages designed and made
 by Sara Young. 2013.

In her brief to us, Jules asked for a tear-drop shaped Bride's bouquet arrangement (Centre), with a contemporary edge.The bouquet consisted of deep red roses and delicate white feathers, and was interspersed with vintage brooches;some dated back as far as 1918.

Jules also told us that both she and her husband to be Myles liked steam-punk and vintage style, and asked if we could incorporate this into our designs with out being too 'left of centre'

We were only too happy to oblige, as we both have a soft spot for this style too!
It is fair to say that we had lots of fun designing and creating these accessories, perhaps even a little too much fun!


For the bridesmaids, Jules chose to combine long stemmed Calla Lillie's with a red centrepiece, which was then draped with crystals to complement the bridesmaids dresses. Simple white rose arrangements were chosen for the Mothers of the Bride and Groom to complement any outfit they chose to wear.

Corsages for the Mothers of the Bride and Groom

The button holes were crafted using simple flowers, but as you can see form the picture, the steam punk element was incorporated here too, with wire wrapping and tiny cogs detailing some of the foliage.

The cake topper that Jules chose was also designed to echo the Bride and Groom's accessories. In the bouquet, tiny crystal beads were fixed over the flowers in the little bouquet, and steam-punk cogs were fixed on to the top hat

By all accounts the couple, their families and guests all had a fabulous time, and we were privileged to be able to help make something beautiful for Jules and Myles on their big day.

If you would like us to create something similar for you, please get in touch either through the blog comments section below, or via our Facebook page at: https://www.facebook.com/AmethystSky2012 and we will do our very best to help you. 

Wedding Photography by Jeff Whiting:
you can see more of his fabulous work here >
 http://www.flickr.com/photos/technojeff/

The Summer Collection.

Hello again dear readers!

Yes, it's true, there has been a little bit of  gap between posts from the Amethyst Studio's recently. Apologies to anyone who was waiting with baited breath for the latest instalment of the studio shenanigans!

So what have we been up to?

Well, as you know the Bletchley Park 'Summer on the Lawn' event is looming on the horizon and we are frantically preparing everything we need to for this. As usual the 'to do' list seems to grow daily rather than shrink, but we are edging ever closer to the finish line and extremely excited about all of the activities, stalls and acts that we have lined up for the weekend.

There is so much to see and do over the course of the event that it would be impossible to list everything here, but our sister company Cerulean Sky Ltd are handling things well and working closely alongside us and the events coordinator at Bletchley Park to ensure everything runs smoothly.

Among of the highlights of the weekend will be a vintage clothing fashion show, which will see a catwalk procession of models showcasing various designers work.

We are working along side one of our team at Cerulean Sky Ashly Ellis, who is not only a model, but also runs a small Pin-up girl agency of her own. You can find out more about her on our Cerulean Sky blog page

http;//www.blog.cerulean-sky.co.uk

Image supplied with kind permission
from Model Ashly Ellis.

The designers have been working hard and have created ensembles to represent fashions from varying era's right up to the 1950's. We have encouraged everyone taking part in the weekend to dress themselves and their stalls in keeping with the theme of Bletchley Park, although we are also all keen to highlight the pre war history of the park too so are including all fashion era's from Victorian times onwards.

We have also decided to set up a kissing booth, where people can have their photo taken with one of the models kissing them (just on the cheek, or a peck on the lips though; no tongues I'm afraid!) We think this will make the day just that little bit more attractive to those who aren't just coming for the great day out and ubiquitous retail therapy opportunities!

Along with the crafters and artists that will be joining us are local cake makers, brewers, fruit and vegetable producers, florists, meat producers, and much more, and a host of volunteers have kindly offered to assist us with some fairground sideshow attractions.

We will be having a silent auction, where people will be able to make sealed bids for various items which will be donated by those involved in the day. The proceeds of this will be shared among the charitable organisations who will be joining us over the weekend these include:

Bletchley Park Trust - http://www.bletchleypark.org.uk/
Open Door - http://www.opendoormk.org.uk/
MK Arts Gateway - http://www.artsgatewaymk.org.uk/

 Among the lots being auctioned off is this absolutely stunning print, which has been donated by local fine artist Shelley Sapwell Wynnedebank, you can see more of her work and details of her upcoming gallery shows here: http://shellywyndebank.weebly.com/

We will also be joined by:

Inter-Action - www.interactionmk.org.uk
MK Play Association  - http://mkplayassociation.wordpress.com/
Woodchucks Recycling - http://www.woodchuck.org.uk/
Branch out - http://branchoutmkcic.wordpress.com/about/

all of whom will be raising awareness of their various causes and, hopefully, raising some cash for themselves with the sale of their wares and visitor participation in the activities on offer! Inter-Action and MK Play association will be providing family oriented fun with activities for kids and Woodchucks and Branch out will be showing off some of their skills and promoting their causes. (more on this in our next blog!)

If this wasn't enough, there will be demonstrations from a local chainsaw sculptor and from local smithy Nick Packham will be bringing along a portable forge to demonstrate some of his excellent skills - which the kids can also get involved in! There will be re-enactors, May pole dancing and musical acts, as well as involvement form local radio station MKFM.

So, what of our own work?

Well we have been developing the designs and construction of our new summer collection - we are looking into which colours and themes are hot this summer and creating a few new pieces which we are hoping everyone will love as much as we do! As ever, the temptation to keep them for ourselves is ever present, but alas, we have to let some of them go.

Sara has been perfecting her wire wrapping technique and has created this stunning piece which we don't think we are going to have for long.

I am proud to say that I designed this piece with a colour scheme which will complement any summer outfit:

This piece is part of a set which includes necklace (pictured)   charm bracelet and earrings.

 We hope you will enjoy both the event, and all of the stalls and activities on offer at Bletchley Park on the 3rd and 4th of August - we look forward to seeing you there!! 

Exciting News From The Amethyst Sky Studio.

Today, we are excited to be able to announce the latest news from the Amethyst Sky studio.

This coming year we will be involved in several fabulous Arts, Craft, Vintage and Handmade fairs, not least of which will be the 'Summer On The Lawn' event, which is taking place at Bletchley Park on 3rd and 4th of August 2013!

We have been excitedly (and a little nervously) taking stock of all of the items that we have - both those for sale and those currently in production - and talking with our sister company Cerulean Sky Ltd (who are helping to organise the event!) about the marketing side of things.

The last fair we took part in was held at Milton Keynes Museum and covered 3 weekends in the run up to Christmas 2012. This event was a great success and, as you can probably imagine, the amount of visitors that the location attracted also brought many people to our stall.

The Christmas Craft Fair which is held there each year offers unique, handmade Christmas gift ideas for anyone looking for that special something that is a 'little bit different'. It seems though that last year, due to increased promotion of the event, the expected footfall at the venue was slightly underestimated, which was great!

However, this event seriously depleted our stock to the point where demand almost outstripped our supply.
This is an enviable position to be in to say the least, and we were astonished by the amount of sales we were making. Luckily, we were able to create more pieces during the event as we had already decided to make this event our priority for these 3 weeks, and had no other clients work or commission pieces booked in.

Having discussed the upcoming Bletchley Park event with our marketing team, it has come to light that the expected footfall at Summer On The Lawn  is expected to be somewhere in the region of 2.5 to 3 thousand people over the whole weekend.

This is fantastic, and not entirely unexpected since the venue is so fabulous and attracts many visitors, for varying reasons, all year round. However, this has presented us with a few small - and lovely - problems. How much stock do we need? and, how much should we take with us?

As a result, we are furiously working on new pieces to add to our summer collection, and putting extra effort in to completing works currently in progress. We have given ourselves some quite ambitious deadlines and goals for the next couple of months.This is so much easier cope with when you are as filled with excited anticipation as we are, and love to engage in the work that you do!

Cerulean Sky Ltd have also informed us that, along side the Arts, Crafts and Handmade goods on sale at the event, there will also be a farmers market, children's entertainment, re-enactors and demonstrations of Heritage artisan crafts by local practitioners. So if you are looking for a great family day out in the summer holidays, look no further!

One of the other participants this year will be Nick Packham, a local Smithy who is well know to us at the Amethyst studio. He will be demonstrating his blacksmithing skills for visitors and will be selling some of his fabulous sculptural work  - you can see some of his pieces here: http://www.ngp-artist-and-blacksmith.co.uk
(Nick is also an assistant curator of the Tecton Gallery in Milton Keynes - go check it out if you can, you won't regret it!) http://www.tectongallery.com

If you are interested in booking a stall at the event, either for your own crafts or for your produce, get in touch with our marketing team at:
http://www.cerulean-sky.co.uk - they will be able to send you more information and an application form to book yourself a stall!

You can follow us on twitter via @AmethystSkyArts, where we will also be posting updates and promoting our new pieces whenever possible.

Look our for updates and more information about the event on the Bletchley Park website too:
http://www.bletchleypark.org.uk/calendar/event_detail.rhtm?cat=special&recID=680644

Most importantly - if you can - do come long to the event, we would love to meet you.

P
x