I was surprised to find, on selling my ‘back catalogue’ of jewellery to Didier, that he called me a ‘Brutalist’ jeweller, a movement I had only identified with architecture. I myself had always felt sympathetic to the Japanese concept of Wasabi when I learned about it. For me jewellery was about learning the feel and poetry of metals such as silver, gold and steel, of how they felt to work, that and the metal work I saw in museums like the Wallace Collection and the British museum. Jewellery was an exciting place for me to be at the time.

From ‘Shadows’ touring exhibition in the 80’s

Below a woven silver collar exhibited at the V & A in 1977. I spent a long time trying to learn first to control and then to free up again whilst developing diffusion welding techniques and exploring the possibilities. In other words, playing.

Below fused gold and silver with no solder used except in the chain.

I became interested in heavier use of the fusion points of precious metals.

I wanted to make ‘jewellery in which one can ‘feel’ the aliveness of the metal.

Below a bracelet made as the result of winning a competition. One of the few times I used stones. It is now in the Birmingham museum collections.

Below, etched and welded steel with fused and woven silver.

Below, a woven and fused silver hair ornament

Below, a pair of earings.

I must have become interested in Abstract Expressionism

I was making jewellery for an imaginary world, one that I found in museums and books.

Below, I played with making jewellery that could be floated on the miscus of water and didn’t need soldering.

Below a gold brooch/pendant commissioned to hold this stone.

Below, carved wax, curled up for casting and then straightened again.