Bank Holiday Freepost Offer

We thought we ought to celebrate the Bank Holiday weekend by having another freepost offer.  The offer is for free delivery to our UK customers by standard post (does not apply to upgraded post options), and our international customers can apply the same code to receive a £2.50 discount towards any purchases. No minimum order!

Simply use the code BANKHOLIDAY at checkout.  Valid until midnight Monday 27th May.

Have a lovely weekend everyone!

Fabulous Domes

We can't keep our hands off these wonderful domes!  The fishbowls are just amazing.  They are great as a simple display container, mini-terrariums, snowglobes and um, fish bowls!  Not that we'd recommend keeping any *real* lifeforms in there, but it would be fun to try with a bit of resin...  We will bring you that tutorial when it's ready!

For now we have popped these on rings and dangled them from button lids.  The main thing to note is the opening size, as you will need settings of the same size as the opening.  The fishbowls are available in three sizes:

- 20 x 12mm (that means the orb measures 20mm across and the opening is 12mm so this one will be great for our 12mm rings and earrings)
- 25 x 16mm (perfect for our 16mm rings and earrings and button lids)
- 30 x 20mm (rings of this 20mm size are coming soon, but we do have button lids)

The button lids look like this:

All they need is a jump ring and a chain, and you will have a fab dangly bowl.

The most difficult decision will be what to put inside! We have been seeing a lot of dandelion jewellery lately and love its flowy ethereal quality:

But ahh, confetti from a memorable day!  Poppy and bright and in your face and just perfect.

In the coming days we will be experimenting with liquids so keep a look out for new projects and ideas!

Glasses Chain

If you are anything like me - myopic and astigmatic to a T - you probably won't have a need for these.  I never can take my glasses off, all hell would quite possibly break loose if I did.  But if you are an occasional glasses wearer, say for reading, you will understand the value of a chain for your glasses, that you can hang around your neck, always keeping your specs at hand ready to be put on at a moment's notice.

We now stock the handy little rubber bits that connect the chain to the glasses, so we thought a trial was in order.  We got together some chain, jump rings (not shown), some fancy bow connectors that have just arrived in the shop, two 10mm connector blanks and a set of epoxy stickers to fit - as the connector blanks are double sided we used four stickers.  We picked a piece of scrapbooking paper with a sweet little rose pattern for our inserts.  All the metal pieces are vintage copper finish.

We started by making the little connector blanks, first stick the epoxy domes onto your patterned paper and cut around this, then ModPodge the little pieces onto your connector blanks, allowing them a bit of time to dry.  If the glue is too much and overspills (like it did here!), it's not a big problem as it cleans up nicely when dry.

Then lay out all your pieces so that all your bows and your flower images are facing the right way up.

Attach to your chain, pop your rubber connectors on with a jump ring and model on your glasses.  Result!

Shrink Plastic Jewellery

We have now started selling amazing shrink plastic.

Here are some quick instructions on what we do:

• choose the right product for your purposes: Shrinkles Shrink Art will be good for stamping and drawing; Shrinkjet for printing from an inkjet printer
• use permanent inks (thin lines work best) or coloured pencils (not soft or waxy).  For the black shrink plastic, metallic pens work well

• cut your artwork around the shape of the design.  The plastic may not shrink evenly so you may not get a perfect circle or square, even if you use a craft punch, but free flow shapes will be great
• make any holes you may need for jump rings at this stage (a standard hole punch 7mm away from the edge is good for this)
• preheat your oven to 175oC, 350oF, Gas Mark 3
• prepare a flat and smooth baking tray by lining it with foil and a layer of baking parchment.  High walled baking trays will not work well here.
• the makers recommend a book but we like to warm up a pan a little bit and have another piece of baking parchment nearby.
• pop your piece onto the cool baking tray and in the oven.  You will see it curl up and then flatten. 
• once flat again remove the baking tray from the oven, immediately cover your piece with parchment paper and press the warmed pan over it.  If the pan is hot it could burn your piece - keep it warm only - the idea is that your piece will be kept warm enough by the pan to flatten completely.
• carefully remove the piece and leave to cool
• at this point you can tidy up any sharp edges or uneven shape with a file
• use a couple of coats of ModPodge to seal the image
• we also like to apply a top layer of glossy accents onto the image for a glossy, resin-y look
• glue/thread onto the jewellery of your choice

We will add some photos of the process soon - in the excitement we forgot to take any good ones!  Now we have to have another making session all over again.  Ah, well.  A perk of the job. :)

New Hollow Bowls

Hello Inspiration! Good to have you back! We know you only went away momentarily as we were fretting and faffing with taxes and pricing and all unexciting things, but then in came these beautiful hollow bowls and there you were! It is good to have you here again!

So you will have already seen these amazaroola new hollow bowls.  They are delicate, they are fragile, they have a lovely handmade feel about them.  They will serve to encase your precious mementos, your artistic little sculptures and a myriad miniature worlds.

We have come up with several ideas for them already, but we must pace ourselves. So we bring you just one little idea, nothing particularly new about it, it simply revolves around the idea of picking a simple concept and converting it into a small (very small) representation of the life-size one.  In this case, I had been sitting in the garden and thought I would try to encapsulate my garden into a pendant tray.  Yes I could have taken a photo and set it under a cabochon, but I really wanted a diorama effect.  So I gathered my materials:

and went about the making of the piece.  I had:

• ModPodge
• a pendant tray
• a hollow glass dome
• a piece of backing paper from a scrapbooking set
• a detailed scrapbooking paper sheet
• scissor, brush, pointy tweezers - and not in the photo, but they were nearby, a set of colourful Sharpie pens

Firstly I glued the blue backing paper into the tray.  I had traced around a bigger piece using the glass dome and cut it to size so it would fit the tray. As it had a slight wave pattern and I wanted it to sit straight, it needed a bit of gentle manouvering into position.

I then applied glue to the bottom border and glued on the nicer and greener bits of moss I found.

With another coat over the bottom of the moss itself I was able to add a second layer for depth.

I had picked the larger scrapbooking paper because it had some teeny tiny butterflies and ladybirds that I could cut out - easier said than done!  It might have been better to use an X Acto knife here as the detail was just too much for my huge ploddy scissors.  Alas, we did what we could.  These tiny paper insects were then folded slightly for a slight 3d effect and glued into position in the tray.  

Hmm, not quite right.  The insects looked washed out and the paper could be seen through the rim of the glass. Resort to Sharpie help.   Coloured pens gave the insects the extra burst of colour I wanted, and a quick go around the edge of the background paper with a black pen meant any paper showing would not be visible around the edge of the glass.  Of course I needed to push the moss into the tray a little bit to allow the glass to sit nicely at the very edge.

Let everything dry for a good day or so.  As all the bits of glue dry, if you pop your glass top onto your piece too soon, you will find droplets of condensation form soon after. 

When dry, I dabbed a little ModPodge on the rim of the glass - this glass is very fragile and so it won't be subjected to many knocks and bumps.  I believe ModPodge will be strong enough for the job, but if in doubt, you can use E6000.  Place it gently onto the piece, ensure there are no stray bits of moss escaping and there you have a cute little diorama piece.  

Sweet!  

VAT and a 20% Bank Holiday Discount

We are now VAT-registered which means we have to charge VAT on all our products – this will entail a price increase in a number of items as standard rate VAT (20%) has to be added onto the product price.  Nobody likes a price rise really, hence we will try to absorb as much of the increase as we can and bear the costs ourselves.  Regrettably we don't have a lot of room to manoeuvre on this, so for some of our items you will see a little increase in prices. 

For the moment, our website and checkout system will not change (though we are working towards a funky new website!). So for now, your shopping experience will remain the same.  If you are a VAT registered business however and require VAT invoices please get in touch and we will be happy to issue these accordingly.

Whilst we set the wheels in motion and update the current website with the new prices we thought you would appreciate a little bit of a discount.  So from now until midnight on Bank Holiday Monday (6th May) you have a chance to get a 20% discount across all items in the shop!   If you are quick, you can get the discount on our pre-VAT prices too!  The code to use at checkout is SPRING20.

And just to explain, only a small number of items will increase by the full VAT rate of 20% as we will try to minimise the impact where possible - but even if the full 20% has been applied, a 20% discount on an item with VAT added will always be cheaper than the pre-VAT price - that is to say, imagine a £1 item needs to have VAT at 20% added, so it then costs £1.20.  But with our 20% offer this Bank Holiday weekend, the price you pay is £0.96.  Or if you snap it up before the VAT increase, you only pay £0.80!  

We do apologise again for the bare appearance of our blog and FB – we are busy with the new website and grappling with new-found taxes, but promise we will be back to full creative flow soon with some fun projects and exciting new products!  Ok, here’s a clue:

Yes, they are here!!

Have a wonderful Bank Holiday weekend everyone!

Flash Freepost Offer!

Our bit of South London, like most of the rest of the UK, is by now carpeted in snow, and once the kids have had enough playtime (is there such a thing? in the snow??) we will probably be heading home for a snug indoorsy weekend.  We may surf the web, we may shop a little, except that if you are anything like us Christmas may have also left you a little bit, shall we say, financially depleted...  So we thought we'd offer a little boost to your winter crafting with a Freepost offer - or £2.50 discount to our international customers.  No minimum spend!  Use the code SNOWFLAKE at checkout.  (This code is valid until midnight Sunday 20th, use it as many times as you like!) Any orders received using this code will be shipped on Monday 21st, so take your time, get those hot chocolates ready, and plan your spring ranges at leisure!

EDIT:  Thank you to all who placed an order over the weekend - we are hoping to still send all orders out today and we understand that there will be a post collection this afternoon, however there is still much snow around here and elsewhere in the country, and the roads are a little bit treacherous, so we ask for your understanding if orders arrive a little later than usual in this weather.  

Would you like to join us?

Welcome, January!

We do love the start of the year, all full of well intended resolutions and fresh plans.  At the moment however we seem to have more plans than hands, so we wanted to put the word out there that we could really do with some help - if you live locally to us in South London (SW16, to be precise), can spare 15-20 hours a week and already have an interest in jewellery making, we would love to hear from you.  We are looking for a bright and dependable someone to start as soon as possible, to be involved in all aspects of the business which will include preparing orders, office management, customer service and much more.

If you would like to know more, or know someone who does, ask Jasmin (jasmin@jasminstudio.com) for a full job description.  Closing date for applications is on Wednesday 16th January.

We look forward to welcoming a new member to the team!

Christmas Posting Dates and Opening Times

If you need your parcel before Christmas, please make sure you order before 11am on the following days for your destination:

Wednesday 5th December - Asia, Australasia
Friday 7th December - Africa, Central & South America, Caribbean, Middle East
Monday 10th December - North America, Eastern Europe
Wednesday 12th December - Western Europe
Thursday 20th December - UK

The above includes registered and recorded services as well as International Signed For and Airsure services.

You may order on Friday 21st and if you purchase the Next Day / Saturday Delivery option and we receive payment before 11am that day, we will still be able to send the items for you to receive them before the big day.

We will be closed from the afternoon of Friday 21st for Christmas but will be back on 2nd January.  Orders received during this period will be sent out as soon as possible on our return but may take slightly longer to get to you.

Have a joyful Christmas and a very crafty New Year!

x

Royal Mail's "Delivery to a Neighbour" Service - a Good Thing?

This is one for our UK readers :)

From the beginning of this month, Royal Mail will leave your items with a neighbour if you are not at home when they try to deliver.  My question is, what do you think of this?

Whilst I can see the positives of such a system, I am not entirely convinced.

Yes, chances are you will get your delivery when you get in from work, which beats a trip to the Post Office on a Saturday morning.  Good.

That is of course assuming you have good neighbours. I am fortunate to say we do. Well, at least the ones we know!  They are lovely people who will even bring our post to us, and we do the same for them. Tea often forms part of the exchange.  However, we don't know all our neighbours - we live in a highly populated part of London and people move in and out of our street practically on a daily basis.

Would I want my purchases going to a relative stranger?  I'm not sure I would, I'm a bit too reserved to share my online purchases with all of my street, but ok, let's call it an opportunity to make a new friend when I call round to collect.

Would I want my valuable jewellery purchases going to a relative stranger?  Errr... no, I don't think so.

I have faith that many of our customers will welcome this move by Royal Mail, and I agree that if you have a good relationship with your neighbours and are happy for them to receive your post if you are out, then it does make life a lot easier when you don't have to queue up to collect your delivery from the Post Office.

I do wonder however - has anyone asked the neighbours how they feel about this?  The OAPs, stay-at-home mums, homeworkers and everyone else who spends a large part of their time around the home?  Will their homes become a depot for the street, Amazon boxes stacking up behind their front door?

It is a tricky situation for online businesses - we want our deliveries to get to our customers safely and quickly.  However these two qualities seem to be at odds with one another with this new system, it may well gain speed, but what impact does it have on the safety element?

Our contract of sale is with the customer, not with the customer's neighbour at number 56.  What happens when the customer is unable to get their item back from number 56?  Will Royal Mail still entertain a claim for loss when they have delivered it to the neighbour?  Does delivering your orders *anywhere* mean that Royal Mail have satisfied their agreement to us?  I'm not entirely sure.

A question for all of you who buy or sell online - how many times have you experienced or your customers reported that a "while you were out" card was not actually left when a delivery was attempted?  At least before, if the seller could confirm the item had been shipped, the customer would have the Post Office as the only port of call.  Now, if that should happen, your parcel could be anywhere on your street!  Ah, fun and games!

Anyone working in jewellery, whether you sell components or finished pieces, will know that we often deal with valuable items - expensive precious metals or stones, pieces of jewellery that have taken time and effort to create,  one-off items that are custom made for a specific customer and impossible to replicate - and if you undertake jewellery repairs, you will often handle personal effects and mementos that are unique and irreplaceable.  Are you happy to send those knowing that they may be delivered somewhere other than where you want them to be?

You see, the onus on getting the items to the right person apparently relies on the recipient.  If the customer would like their delivery of sterling silver items to be sent to them only and not to their neighbours, then the customer needs to contact Royal Mail and wait to be sent an Opt-Out sticker that they then put on their front door to indicate that their deliveries should go to them and not the neighbours.  That'll win you friends in the neighbourhood!  Will look nice in my front door too - which we've just decorated a pretty shade of blue, except it was missing a little something - ah yes! a clearly visible royal mail sticker of course!!

Ok, I may sound a little bit negative here... as I mentioned earlier, I can see the positives, really I can... I just fail to be convinced by them!

I suppose this is something that will be really good for some people and a terrible idea for some others, but still, I'd really love to hear your views on this please!

Jasmin x

To find out more visit Royal Mail's website, or obtain an opt-out form here.