Jenni Wilson

Jenni Wilson

jenni@jenni-wilson.co.uk

With personalisation coming in all shapes and sizes, there are a lot of different ways to put your mark on what you wear, in particular jewellery. We all want to stand out and show our own unique style and finding different and new ways to do this is something that we all do and enjoy. Showing off our new finds to our friends and even making new trends of our own.

The jewellery designer Jenni Wilson has given us an original way to personalise our lives with her washing line jewellery. The small interval charms that hook over the necklace gives us a chance to add, swap and rearrange the charms to match our mood, outfit and occasion. 

Having the subject of the piece being a normal every day item like washing on the washing line, it brings a sense of the familiar and surreal. With the range of small charms from tops, shorts, dresses, pants, each one is beautifully finished. With a range of colours to choose from it is a charming and different way to customise your jewellery.

Dear Jenni Wilson

My names Sarah and I am at the moment working on a project about personalised jewellery and whilst researching the subject my tutor Stuart  directed me to your washing line collection.They are exactly what I was looking for and if you don't mind it would be a great help to me if you could answer some of my questions.

When did you realise that you wanted to be a jewellery designer ?

I first took an interest in designing jewellery while on my Applied Arts degree at the University of Derby but I liked all kinds of 3D design so I wasn’t sure at that point that I wanted jewellery design to be my career.

What training did you have before setting up your business ?

Following on from A-levels, an Art Foundation course and my degree, I spent a year on a setting up scheme for creative businesses in the Jewellery Quarter (known as the Taylor-Burgess Design Enterprise scheme at that time, later known as DesignSpace).  It was while on this scheme that I started to build a collection of more saleable jewellery.  I received mentoring and business training and took part in two trade fairs so it was during this year, having started to receive trade orders, that I decided to set up my own business and become a full time jewellery designer and maker.

Do you think their is enough jewellery that you can personalisable out there ?

There is definitely a market for personalised jewellery.  In my opinion, this is an extremely strong selling point for a small business such as mine.  It is impossible to compete with large manufacturers so being able to offer a personalised and unique item in a friendly way is a huge part of what I do.  I also think that with more and more sales taking place over the internet, it becomes much more straightforward for potential customers to connect directly with designers.

What gave you the idea for your washing line necklace ?

I developed the washing line jewellery while on the setting up scheme and it could be described as a ‘light-bulb’ moment!  I was working on completely different ideas and I made a ring with two prongs sticking up from it.  I suddenly decided to hang a little T shirt from it and quickly set about making other items of clothing and so the washing line necklace was born!

Are you planing on expanding the washing line necklace ? Are you planing to make more personalised jewellery in the future ?

I have been very quiet with my business for the last six years since having had children, so I do not have a current website (I am very close to completing a new one which will include an online shop).  You are therefore not to know that the washing collection is actually quite extensive with all kinds of other jewellery items based on the theme of washing.  I also have a cooking range, a collection of charms called ‘furry sparrow’ charms based on the idea of a sparrow who collects interesting bits and bobs.  In addition I have recently been developing a brand new collection which uses cut out ransom note style letters.   A key part of this range will be the fact that the customer can choose their own words or phrases from a large selection of letter types to form their own piece of personalised jewellery.

What techniques and materials do you used to make your jewellery ?

Much of my work incorporates the use of lost wax casting which involves me making a metal master – for this I use techniques such as piercing, soldering, engraving and stamping.  This master is then sent to a company in the Jewellery Quarter where a mould is made and castings are produced usually in silver but sometimes gold.  I then use these cast components in all manner of ways, joining them, embellishing them, and forming them into various different types of jewellery.  Obviously cast components are not completely unique so the personalised aspect of a washing line necklace would be the ability of the customer to choose the combination of clothes, the finish I apply and possibly having a hand stamped message on a tag.

 How many charms do you offer ?

I offer 30 clothing charms, around 50 furry sparrow charms and I will soon be offering around 100 letter charms (amongst many other jewellery items).

I hope to launch my website later this year and a big part of that will be explaining to customers that, as well as my ready-made pieces, I am able to offer one-off commissions or adapt any of my current components to form a bespoke piece of jewellery.