Workshop Review: Silver Jewellery for Improvers at Amy Surman

I attended the ‘Silver Jewellery for Improvers’ workshop at Amy Surman a couple of months ago, with great results, so, here’s my review for anyone else interested in attending. It was overall a pleasantly different experience to the one I had on the Stone Setting course at Holts’ Academy (you can read my review of that here).

The basics

Workshop name: Silver Jewellery for Improvers

Cost: £70 + materials

Timings: 6 hours (incl. lunch) on a Saturday (Amy also does a weekly class version)

Location: Amy Surman Oxford Bead Shop, Cowley, Oxfordshire

Skill level: Intermediate, but suitable for most levels except complete beginner (other workshops are available with more guided tuition for complete beginners)

Website: www.amysurman.co.uk

Overview

The Oxford Bead Shop is an independent retailer owned by Amy Surman, who offers a great selection of workshops across a number of different jewellery topics and disciplines, from silversmithing and metal clay to beading and lampwork. She also offers one-to-one private tuition at a reasonable price.

The Silver Jewellery for Improvers workshop is designed for those that have tried some form of silversmithing before and want to explore new techniques and designs, without being restricted to one particular technique. I found this was a great opportunity to try new things that I had wanted to try, with the support of a more experience tutor overseeing and advising.


In Amy's words: "The idea of the class is to give people who can't make our very popular weekly class the opportunity to come along for a whole day to explore and make their own projects with my support and gain ideas from the other three people in the class."

Pendant by another attendee

The workshop is limited to only 4 spaces (there were only 3 including myself when I attended) which meant we got a vast amount of one-to-one teaching and advise over the course of the 6 hours. Attendees are encouraged to make something to their own design, so it’s a good idea to bring a design along – if not, students have time at the start to come up with a design with help from the tutor and her wealth of books for inspiration. The small group also allows attendees to get insight into others’ designs and the techniques they are learning, which is really nice.