Note: Annoyingly blogger deleted all the content of this post, so all my words have gone out the window! I will try my best to rewrite, but apologies if its a bit short/muddled, I'm very behind on blogposts!
So for this term, we had to choose two modules, one of which was a two-day workshop called Gems in Transit. The project focuses on gems and their influence across chronologies and geographies. For the most part, the two days consisted of presentations from scholars from many different places talking about Mughal gems, pearls, and crystals. Their topics related gems to themes about power, gender, knowledge, collaboration and technology - it was a fascinating insight into their project, and I look forward to reading their papers when they are published.
There were also some more practical aspects to the workshop. After a morning of presentations, we had the opportunity to handle some of the objects with gemstones from the Metalwork collection. The spread started with a point cut diamond ring from the 1500s, all the way to a 20th century equivalent brilliant cut diamond cluster ring.
I took some pictures of my favourites which vary from minimal sophistication to outright gaudy fabulousness: The first was a beautiful bloodstone box, made in Paris around the mid-1730s,which is actually a deep, rich forest green (it's a bit rubbish in the pictures). It almost doesn't seem to really be gemstone, but once opened and you could see the translucency of the stone it just made it all the more exquisite. The second image is of a Victorian diamond ring, with three rose-cut diamonds. It looks strikingly contemporary, which makes me wonder whether it has gradually seeped back into fashion in the jewellery world (this is especially as jewellery designers have been able to have further platforms to open up the design process via social media...can't help lusting over Digby & Iona's instagram just as one example). Apparently the rose-cut was surpassed by the brilliant cut because the brilliant cut enables light to refract more efficiently inside the diamond, thus giving it a striking sparkle. The last is an outrageous Victorian brooch that incorporates diamonds, garnets, topaz, turquoise, spinel and amethyst. Nevertheless, it left us gemmies all lusting and sparkly eyed for our very own blingy bits.
The next activity was to cut some gems ourselves. We all ventured to Blythe House together to meet Nicholas Yiannarakis, a jeweller and gem-cutter who also teaches lapidary at Holts Academy in Hatton Garden. He brought in a domestic set of machinery for cutting and polishing gems, and a handful of stones (albeit not as precious as diamonds or emeralds) for us to play with. We were given a selection of jaspers, agates, and quartz and shown how to cut with a tiny jigsaw, and polish with a teeny sanding belt. All of the machinery had to incorporate water in order to keep the stones cool, so it ended up being quite a messy task.
Now, I'm off to beautiful Liverpool for the bank holiday, have a lovely long weekend!
