Englana's® Creative Director, Helen Gutteridge, has formed in recent months, an exciting and dynamic collaboration with silversmith and jewellery designer, Sue Chadwick. Sue has been creating stunning silver jewellery for years now, selling her sought after designs throughout the world.
Helen, who has long admired Sue’s work, commissioned her to create a bespoke solid silver heart which would provide the finishing touches on the heritage leather keyring, The Montgomery, making it a true collector’s item. With only 100 commissioned, The Montgomery, is a true limited edition masterpiece. Here, Sue tells us her thoughts about the collaboration:
"What a wonderful collaboration we have had, working creatively through the design process with various heart options experimented with and discussed, before settling on our final design. It's elegance and simplicity shone through... but you only know that having had fun exploring and getting to know each other and seeing the products and their new combination working together... leather and silver.
"The Englana® heart is a rounded 3 dimensional heart with a slim curving window to allow the glow of this luxurious leather to shine through."
"I begin by sketching to get those first ideas and thoughts out of my head and see if I can convert the mental visual to the 2D sketch... I then begin sculpting my vision in wax, forming and creating from the 2D version into the tactile (3 Dimensional) version. This is the part that I love even more... sometimes something extra suddenly appears whether it is a texture or a fold or layer or in this case a sweeping cheeky window.
"The wax sculpted piece is then converted into silver using the ancient lost wax casting method. This new silver Heart is finished and polished and prepared for laser engraving. The beautiful Englana® Logo is then etched onto the Heart to complete the envisioned design.
"The Heart then travels to the London Assay office for hallmarking. As these Hearts are limited Edition Englana® Hearts each one also bears a number ranging from 001 to 100."
The Montgomery launched at Hickstead to great acclaim. There are not many left so make sure you order your limited edition solid silver keyring today.
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