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2009 is the centenary of AA Thornton and so as part of these celebrations I very much wanted to create a special item to mark the important event. My thoughts were that this item should reflect current jewellery trends and also embrace the 100 year history and heritage of the family business. I also felt it important that it should not only be exclusive, but also to be available and within the budget of the vast majority of our customers. Lastly, and in a funny sort of way, I wanted it to have something which reflected a little bit of me.

With this brief in mind I thought up and rejected many ideas before finally settling on the AA Thornton Bead. Beads are currently highly fashionable and as I mentioned in my article late last year “they are miniature bundles of secrets waiting to be revealed. They so often mirror the culture of which they are a part, that they tell us a great deal about the social, political, economic and religious lives of the people who have made and worn them”

To ensure they were both exclusive and within the vast majority of our customers budget, I decided that I should make them a limited edition of 100 beads and give them away free of charge to the first 100 customers who spent £100 on beads. 100 years 100 beads £100. The beads should also be made of silver, which reflects my original training as

a silversmith. So now I had the idea, all I had to do was design the bead and have it made.

I freely admit that I became really excited and it brought back the memory of some years ago, when I first returned to Kettering to work for my father and was given the job of designing and creating a

stickpin for the Buttonhook Society of which my father was a member. That brief

was that it should resemble a simple Victorian buttonhook and be made in silver or gold. It needed to be easily reproduced and so required a manufacturing technique that could create as many as the society needed. I certainly enjoyed that challenge of creating a simple but appealing design and now once

again I found myself thoroughly immersed in this exciting new project.

The first thing I had to do is have a clear idea of what I wanted from the bead. It needed to be unique, reflect the heritage of AA Thornton and yet be appealing and attractive so that you would want to wear it as part of a bead bracelet of the current Chamilia or Pandora style. The solution to this was looking down on me from the beams of the shop; I should use our own AA Thornton hallmark in some way and incorporate it into a design. The AA Thornton sponsors mark is a cloverleaf design incorporating the letters AAT and for those that are interested please read my previous

Birth of a Bead by sally thornton at aa thornton

Call: 01536 373724 Email: angela@4locals.net Web: www.4locals.net 27

Birth of a Bead by sally thornton at aa thornton

Call: 01536 373724 Email: angela@4locals.net Web: www.4locals.net

So far this year I have been writing about Birthstones and now that it is April my subject should be Diamonds. Last year, however, I wrote 5 articles on what is after all a girl’s best friend, so this month I thought I would take a break from birthstones and have a look at something which is a little different.

article on Hallmarking which can be found on www.aathorntonjeweller.com or do come and look at the beams in the shop.

The initial design stage for the bead used my working sketches and notes. The main focus was to use the shape of the hallmark design on the bead so that it is visually appealing even if you had no idea of its history. After all Jewellery is first and foremost to adorn and be beautiful, whilst the history is that bundle of secrets just waiting to be revealed. My idea was to have this hallmark shape recessed into the bead and then Oxidised to give a black colour to contrast with the polished silver colour of the bead.

My rough sketches were quickly put onto CAD, enabling images in 3D to be produced allowing me to clearly visualise and play around with my ideas. At this point I could gain a good idea as to what the final bead would look like and narrowed my thoughts down one or two designs.

The next process was to have a resin model of my preferred design made up and at this point I could hold in my hand a representation of the bead. So we had moved from the idea, the sketches, computer images and now a real solid object, all be it made from a green resin. At this stage I admit that my original design was just a little too small and would not have looked right on a bracelet with other beads, so I was able to scale it up slightly to ensure it looked the right size.

From this original resin, the master bead was made and placed into a rubber mould. This rubber mould will be used to make the one hundred waxes which are produced in batches of twenty or thirty at a time. These beads are then cleaned up, polished and oxidised and lastly ready

to be hallmarked by the London Assay Office.

The bead is now finished and ready to make its grand entrance! I am very pleased with the end result and I will soon have one of these beads to add to my Camellia bracelet. The little bead, although small, is exactly what I wanted to achieve. It has a beautiful finish, a nice

weight to it and of course the AA Thornton hallmark on the

side and pattern shape on the surface, which is subtly enhanced

by the oxidising inside. I think my father would have approved.

I hope you have enjoyed reading this design led article and as ever if you would like more information on any aspect of Jewellery please call in to the shop in Kettering or visit our website www.aathorntonjeweller.com.

by Sally ThorntonAA Thornton1/7 High StreetKettering01536 513014

The Design Process

The CAD of one idea which I discarded

Another CAD of a discarded idea

CAD of the design as it develops

Final CAD of the design

Resin from which the first bead was cast

1st Cast bead Bead with a sprue from which the mould is made

Cleaned 1st bead

1st wax in the rubber mould

1st Bead is finished