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What you'll learn in this episode:   Why even jewelry novices can learn to make silver jewelry at home with affordable tools How Machi and her co-author Janet turned their in-person jewelry making classes into a book What safety concerns to consider when making DIY jewelry How working with silver compares to working with other metals, and where beginner makers should start What mistakes beginner makers commonly make and how to fix them    About Machi de Waard Machi de Waard is a designer-jeweller and jewellery tutor. Jewellery has been her full-time pursuit since early 2007, and Machi's work has been shown at galleries, fairs and exhibitions. Machi combines her studio practice with teaching, having taught jewellery making for over ten years in various locations throughout the UK. Her interests in modern art, particularly in sculpture and minimalism, influence her work.   Additional Resources: -www.machidewaard.co.uk  -insta: @machi_jewellery  -www.janetrichardson.co.uk  -insta: @janrichardsonjewellery Book links: Amazon UK Waterstones Blackwells Search Press Guardian Bookstore Amazon USA Penguin Random House Bol.com in the Netherlands Amazon Germany   Photos Available on TheJewelryJourney,com   Transcript:   Working with metal might seem like something best left to the pros, but Machi de Waard's new book smashes that misconception. Written with Machi's friend and co-author Janet Richardson, “Silver Jewelry Making: A Complete Step-By-Step Course,” includes seven projects that help beginner makers build on their skills and make real jewelry at home with simple tools. Machi joined the Jewelry Journey Podcast to talk about the serendipitous way the book got published; why silver is the best metal for beginners to start with; and which common mistakes DIY makers should watch out for. Read the episode transcript here.    Sharon: Hello, everyone, welcome to the Jewelry Journey Podcast. This is the second part of a two-part episode. If you haven't heard part one, please head to TheJewelryJourney.com.    Today, my guest is Machi de Waard. She, along with Janet Richardson, is the coauthor of the book “Silver Jewelry Making.” They are both jewelers and teachers in Great Britain, and that's where she's speaking to me from. Welcome back.    That's what I wanted to ask you. Do people say to you, “Why do you work in silver and not gold?”    Machi: I'm happy to do any commission in gold. We both do commissions in gold. It's just harder to afford to do large pieces in gold unless somebody's already paying you to do it. It's just very, very expensive.   Sharon: Do you ever rhodium plate your silver with Argentium, or whatever that brand name is?   Machi: Argentium. I use a lot of Argentium in my own work, almost exclusively but not quite, because it doesn't tarnish as much as sterling silver. Janet uses some Argentium silver and sterling silver. I do not rhodium plate partly because rhodium has actually become very expensive as well, and I prefer not to plate things because if there's a plate, it can come off. You don't want the customer to have a piece that looks great and then you have to replate it over a few years. So, I don't really like to plate my pieces unless absolutely necessary. I don't think Janet does much plating either.    Sharon: What's your favorite kind of thing to make? Is it a bracelet, a ring, a necklace?   Machi: Oh, I like all of it. I think Janet and I are both—what's the word—I was going to say obsessed, but maybe passionate sounds better. We are both never bored of jewelry. We like to make pretty much everything. I would say at the moment, my favorite thing is brooches, but I'm happy to make anything.   Sharon: I'm not any kind of maker, but it seems like a brooch would be easier because you only have to make one of those, as opposed to an earring or something where they have to match.   Machi: Yeah, I suppose so, although earrings don't have to match.   Sharon: Today they don't. That's true.   Machi: In the 20s they wore mismatched earrings, so you can always use that excuse. I guess with the brooch, the important thing is the pin. You want a really good pin that's going to hold the brooch up and it's not going to flop forward. It will hold on to whatever you're wearing but also not be impossible to put on and off. There are different things for each piece that you have to look out for.   Sharon: What do you teach your students about pins? Before you even start, do you have to think about what kind of fabric it's going to be worn with?   Machi: Yes, absolutely. A really small brooch, you could wear on linen, but you have to think about the size of the pin, the material you're going to put it through, how it's going to hang, how heavy it is, whether you want a double pin. There are all kinds of different things you can put it on. It depends what you want to use it for, because it's totally different if you want it for, let's say, a winter wool coat versus holding on a silk scarf. It really depends on the end use. You have to think about that before you start making.   Sharon: What are the other things you counsel your students to think about before they start?    Machi: The order of fabrication. If you don't think about it and then you get halfway through your project, then you realize, “Oh, I should have done that before that,” that can cause problems. It's important to have at least a basic plan of the order you're going to do things in so that it works out.   Sharon: Does your book talk about that? It talks about fabrication?   Machi: Yes.   Sharon: Did you have to look for a while before you found a publisher? I can't remember.   Machi: It was actually quite funny. I had been talking to not only Janet, but my other jewelry friends, and I said, “Oh, Janet and I are going to write a book,” and of course it didn't happen. Then one of our jewelry friends was at a craft fair and a publisher, which turned out to be Search Press, approached her and said, “Do you want to write a book about jewelry making?” and she said, “No, absolutely not, but I know somebody who does.” Then Janet and I approached Search Press and proposed what we wanted to write, and it was exactly what they were looking for. It was total serendipity. We wanted to write exactly what they wanted somebody to write for them.    For us, it was fantastic because Search Press is an award-winning craft publisher. Not only are they excellent at editing and putting together the actual book and the layout and so on, but we had a professional photographer for, I think, five days and we worked in the photography studio. We made the things in the studio and the photographer could take pictures of every little detail. We were worried that maybe there would be a limit on the number of pictures they would take, but he took thousands of pictures. We got all the detailed photographs we wanted, which was so important for visual learners especially, to be able to see exactly what we were talking about.   Sharon: Do you have to be a visual learner for this to work?   Machi: I don't think so, but that's because I'm a reader and Janet's a visual learner. She'll look at all the pictures and I'll look at all the words. It turned out to be perfect for the balance, because I was constantly checking the words and she was constantly checking the pictures.   Sharon: I guess I'm not a do-it-yourselfer. Can I learn how to make the jewelry that you talk about in this book?   Machi: Yeah, totally. If you want to, absolutely.   Sharon: If I want to, that's the question. Did the two of you ever teach together in a classroom or any kind of school?   Machi: No, we generally teach our own classes, but we've covered each other's classes quite a bit. When her husband was unwell, I covered her classes, and when I was doing this degree, she covered my classes. We're very comfortable taking over from each other because we know what the other is doing.   Sharon: Did you think about doing this book with somebody else?   Machi: No, it had to be Janet.   Sharon: What would she tell me about working with you?   Machi: I think she would say that we complement each other very well. Janet can do everything she wants to with computers, but it's definitely not her favorite thing. So, I did all the typing. We did everything together. Part of it was during lockdown, so we did loads over Facetime. We would talk over Facetime while I was typing. I typed everything, so that worked out really well. She definitely would have gotten mad at the computer at some point and probably thrown it out the window.   Sharon: Was one of you responsible for CAD or anything like that? When you talk about computers, I think of things that are much more intricate than typing.   Machi: This was just typing. It was just about formatting the text so the publisher could take it and rework it into the format they wanted for the book.   Sharon: Did the publisher tell you how long they wanted it to be or what they wanted in the book?   Machi: Yeah, that was way back at the beginning. When we sat down with them, they said, “O.K., it's going to be 192 pages.” “O.K.” From the get-go, they knew exactly what they wanted, and then we worked with them within those parameters. It's also quite funny; jewelers notoriously have terrible nails because they're constantly getting their nails dirty and breaking. It was actually in the contract that we had to get a manicure before we got the pictures done for the book so our nails wouldn't be too disgusting.   Sharon: Wow! That's like a manicurist. A manicurist usually has nails that aren't done.   Machi: Actually, yeah.   Sharon: So, you had to get manicures before the photos were done.   Machi: Yeah.   Sharon: What kind of troubleshooting tips do you give in the book?   Machi: This is where our experience with teaching really shows because we know in a classroom setting when students get stuck and when they get frustrated. The troubleshooting is about the points that are more difficult. For example, with soldering, there are a lot of little details that can go wrong, and people get frustrated. There's a whole section about solder troubleshooting.    Then there's also quite a bit about making joins. Whenever you put something together, like a ring or a bangle or a jump ring, the join has to be really good. It has to be clean, and it has to fit fairly well. So, there's a whole section about what to do if your join is not good and how to fix it.    There's also troubleshooting for stone setting because there's a bit of a temptation, especially with your first-ever stone setting, to get excited and put the stone in to test if it fits before you should put it in, before the item, whatever it is, is finished. Then people get their stones stuck. There's a whole section for four different ways to get your stone out of a setting because you've put it in too early.   Sharon: Can you do something if a join doesn't fit? If a jump ring doesn't fit, what can you do?   Machi: Yeah. A clear example is when you make a ring and it's too small or too big. What do you do? If it's too small, you can put it back on the ring mandrel, which is like a steel-tapered tool you form the rings around. You can put the ring on it, and then you use a mallet, which is a soft hammer, and you hit it down the mandrel so it stretches it. Just because your ring is too small, all is not lost. You can still stretch it. If it's too big, you can cut out a little piece and then resolder it and make it the right size. There's usually some way of fixing it.   Sharon: Do you talk about that just in your classes, or do you also talk about that in the book?   Machi: It's in the book.   Sharon: Wow! Is the book available everywhere that you would buy an art book?   Machi: I checked and it's available on Amazon U.S., of course, and Target. I'm trying to remember the other American things. I looked up on the internet where it is. To my surprise, it was available in the Brooklyn Library, which is nice.    Sharon: I'm surprised it's available in the U.S. I hadn't thought to look, but I guess it makes sense with Amazon U.S. being so big. I've encountered books that are just in Great Britain and they're not in the U.S., so that's what I was thinking.   Machi: I think that's part of the advantage of working with Search Press because they have so much experience in this arena. They got the book absolutely everywhere. It's on Amazon U.S., U.K., Holland, Japan, Scandinavia, everywhere. It's also on Penguin U.S., I think on the website. I'm not totally sure if it's on the website, but it's definitely available everywhere, basically.   Sharon: Did they do the translating?   Machi: Yup.   Sharon: So, you didn't have to be involved or worry about any of that.   Machi: No, I don't even know the details of that. They just took over all of that because they're super-experienced with these things.   Sharon: That's pretty good. What's your next book?   Machi: We vaguely have an idea to do a follow-up book for this, but I think I might have to convince Janet of it. We'll see.   Sharon: Focusing on silver jewelry again?   Machi: Yes, definitely. We both love making and we love teaching. We just enjoy watching our students go from strength to strength and make their own pieces. Giving people the ability to work on their own is definitely very satisfying.   Sharon: You talk about picking a project in the book and taking it further. Can you give me some examples of that?   Machi: We do the preliminary part of that, and at the end of every project in the book, there's a progression section which says, “Well, now that you can do this, you can do that.” For example, once you have done all the projects, all the way at the end, it shows that you can also make cufflinks and tie tacks based on the information you've learned throughout the other projects. We tried to cover as many different types of pieces of jewelry as possible, so that at the end you can do that.   After that, there's a section in the back about how to design your own jewelry and how to move forward with thinking about how to design and progressing to make other things. It's all building blocks. You need the core skills, which are described in great detail, and you can constantly refer back to those, but you can keep building and building and then using the troubleshooting sections to get you out of problems.   Sharon: It would seem like after you write one book, you'd say, “That's it. I'm done.” What makes you want to write another book?   Machi: I'm not so sure we will because this one took three years from beginning to end. It was a lot of work. It was really, really satisfying, especially because Search Press gave us such a good photographer. It really made it to a quality level that we were very happy with. It had so much detail in the photography and the words. We were really pleased with the outcome and with the feedback we've had. We've had really good feedback from people saying, “I always use this book to get me out of problems when I'm working on my own.” That's really satisfying. Whether we'll actually do another one, I don't know. I have to talk to Janet again.   Sharon: What would be on your wish list? I keep going back to this. Would it be gold? Would it be silver? Would it be copper?   Machi: I think silver again because this is just seven projects, but there's no end to how many projects you could do. For example, I'd be interested in adding a project about doing a box, working with hinges, doing gold foil—which is called keum-boo, where you fuse gold foil to silver—or making a large bangle. There's no end to the possibilities, but just moving it up with different levels of complexity.   Sharon: Fusing gold to a silver object, that seems like it would be asking for trouble in the sense that you're asking for something to come off.    Machi: Well, the gold foil fusing is actually bonding, so it becomes one metal. It can't come off. You could scratch it, but you can't take it off if you do it correctly.    Sharon: Do you see this being the start of your empire, you and Janet, the start of an empire of silver and then going on to bronze or gold or some other metal?   Machi: Both of us just really love silver and the accessibility of silver. Some other people have written very good books about gold. Gold is a whole other thing. I think with silver, there's so much more to explore that still stays accessible in terms of cost. I think we would probably be more interested in that. I am not sure. It depends. I have to bribe Janet.    Sharon: I've heard people say they don't like silver because you have to polish it and polish it—I'm talking about sterling silver—if it's not plated. Somehow that stops it from tarnishing.    Machi: There is no getting around that. Sterling silver will tarnish, but it does tarnish more if you don't wear it. Like a ring, if you just wear it all the time, it generally is going to tarnish less, although it does depend on your skin. Some people's skin reacts with silver more than others. That's why I use a lot of Argentium silver, because it tarnishes far less than regular sterling silver. It's technically more tarnish resistant. It doesn't not tarnish, but it's definitely less, so there's less maintenance with it. That's why I use that. Janet also uses it to some degree.   Sharon: Is it more expensive?   Machi: A fraction, but nothing significant. Sterling silver is 92.5% silver with the rest being copper, and Argentium silver is 94% silver. It has a higher silver content. It also is copper, but it has a little bit of germanium. The germanium forms an oxide on the outside of the metal, which stops it from tarnishing so it stays white. Well, it doesn't entirely stop it from tarnishing, but it keeps it from tarnishing as much as sterling. It definitely stays cleaner. If you're very bothered by tarnish or if you find that you're cleaning your jewelry, I would say to look for Argentium silver jewelry.   Sharon: Is that something you talk about in the book or in your classes?   Machi: I do talk about that in my classes. It's not in the book, but that's partly because when you start, it's just easier to access sterling silver. Now, you can get Argentium in the U.S. and here, no problem, but Argentium was changing slightly. The inventor of Argentium changed the alloy slightly last year, so it's better than it was before, but it was still shifting; things were changing. We didn't discuss it in the book because it would have been too much other information. There's only so much you can cover with jewelry that we had to limit it somehow.   Sharon: 192 pages is still quite limiting.   Machi: Yeah, and there's still a lot in there.   Sharon: What is the difference rhodium and Argentium?   Machi: Rhodium is really used only for plating. Argentium is another silver alloy. So, there's sterling silver and Argentium silver.   Sharon: So, you would make something first and then dip it. I don't know. I have this image of dipping it in the rhodium, but you would make it out of Argentium first.   Machi: Yes, rhodium is a very traditional thing to plate with. White gold especially is often plated with rhodium to keep it very white and then it doesn't tarnish. Silver is generally not rhodium-plated, or at least not for individual makers because it wouldn't make sense cost-wise. It would add a significant amount of cost. Most silver you buy from an individual maker is not going to be plated.    Sharon: That's interesting. I've been told that white gold in its natural form yellows over the years. I don't know if that's true or not.   Machi: Yeah, that's why white gold usually is plated with rhodium gold, especially if it's commercially imported, to guarantee it's rhodium plated. At the moment, there's a bit of a shift going on in the industry with rhodium, partly because it was getting so expensive and partially for environmental reasons. It's not that environmentally friendly. A whole bunch of the platers I use in London were moving away from rhodium to different white metals to change the way they plate so there were fewer environmental issues. So, there's a bit of a shift going with that. You've got to watch the space. Things are changing on that.    Sharon: So, you go back to the same people to buy your stuff from. You keep going back to the same to people buy it. That's interesting.   Machi: Yes, and we have a list in the book—no, we don't have a list. We mention a couple of suppliers, but there's actually a list on the publisher's website for suppliers because suppliers change, of course. In the U.S., the main supplier is Rio Grande, and in the U.K., the main supplier is Cooksongold. Those are the big suppliers. Their websites are excellent, which makes it much easier to order the materials.   Sharon: Are they related, Cooksongold and Rio Grande? I know Rio Grande. Are they related?   Machi: No, not as far as I know. Their owners aren't the same, so I don't think so.   Sharon: O.K. Machi, thank you very much. I'm glad to know that it's not Machi, it's Machi. Thank you. I looked at that and thought, “It sounds right.” It's M-A-C-H-I, and the last name has a “D-E” and then a capital “W-A-A-R-D.” The book is available now. It's “Silver Jewelry Making,” and it's available from Search Press.    Machi: Yes.   Sharon: You can find it in the U.K. and in the U.S. and all over the world, it sounds like, or they can contact you. Thank you, and thank you to Janet. We'll look forward to your next book.   Machi: Thank you very much.    Sharon: Thank you for being here today.   We will have photos posted on the website. Please head to TheJewelryJourney.com to check them out.     

What you'll learn in this episode:   How Beatriz discovered and catalogued the 2,600 rings in the Alice and Louis Koch Ring Collection at the Swiss National Museum How Covid lockdown changed how people wear jewelry Beatriz's tricks for making a jewelry exhibit more engaging What it's like to work with jewels uncovered from shipwrecks How global trade has influenced how jewelry is designed and made   About Beatriz Chadour-Sampson   Beatriz Chadour-Sampson studied art history, classical archaeology and Italian philology at the University of East Anglia, and at the University of Münster, Germany. Her doctoral thesis was on the Italian Renaissance goldsmith Antonio Gentili da Faenza. In 1985 she published the jewelry collection of the Museum für Angewandte Kunst, Cologne. Since 1988 she has worked freelance as a jewelry historian, curator of exhibitions and academic writer in Britain. Her numerous publications on jewelry, ranging from antiquity to the present day, include the The Gold Treasure from the Nuestra Señora de la Concepción (1991), and 2000 Finger Rings from the Alice and Louis Koch Collection, Switzerland (1994). She was the consultant curator in the re-designing of the William and Judith Bollinger Jewelry Gallery at the Victoria & Albert Museum (opened in 2008), London and was guest curator of the ‘Pearl' exhibition (2013-14). She is an Associate Member of the Goldsmiths' Company, London. Today Beatriz Chadour-Sampson works as a freelance international and jewelry historian and scholarly author. Her extensive publications range from Antiquity to the present day.    Additional Resources: Instagram Museum Jewellery Curators - Goldsmiths' Fair Photos available on TheJeweleryJourney.com Transcript:   Working in jewelry sometimes means being a detective. As a freelance jewelry historian and curator of the Alice and Louis Koch Ring Collection at the Swiss National Museum, Beatriz Chadour-Sampson draws on her wealth of knowledge to find jewelry clues—even when a piece has no hallmark or known designer. She joined the Jewelry Journey Podcast to talk about how she creates jewelry exhibits that engage viewers; how she found her way into the niche of shipwreck jewelry; and what it was like to catalogue 2,600 rings. Read the episode transcript here.  Sharon: Hello, everyone. Welcome to the Jewelry Journey Podcast. This is the second part of a two-part episode. If you haven't heard part one, please head to TheJewelryJourney.com. My guest is Beatriz Chadour-Sampson. She's been the curator of the Alice and Louis Koch Ring Collection at the Swiss National Museum for almost 35 years. Welcome back.   Beatriz: You asked about the catalogue. We didn't know if the exhibition was going ahead at one point, but I was asked by V&A Publishing to do a book on pearls, which I did. So, yes, we did a book which was for sale during the exhibition. That was in 2013. We redesigned the jewelry gallery, and 2008 was the end of that. The pearls exhibition was in 2013, the beginning of 2014.   Sharon: Why was it redesigned, the gallery?   Beatriz: The jewelry gallery. With all galleries, there comes a point where they need to be refreshed and renewed, and the previous design needed it. You even had gates you had to get through, and if you weren't quite as slim as myself, you would have problems getting through the gates. When it was redesigned, it was a completely different aesthetic. As I said, the boards have to tell the story, so when the visitor walks in, they have to understand the story and go from one to the other. Some people say the gallery is very full, but it is a study collection. We asked the education department artists to do certain things.    I was very keen on going “from cradle to grave.” The gallery is chronological, so you want a display before you start to know why you wear jewelry. A child wears jewelry or a mother wears jewelry to protect them at childbirth, or they wear it for status or religion or whatever it is. Jewelry is multitasking, multifunctional. Today we think of jewelry as decorative, but that is not the case. Jewelry was made for an occasion and a reason. With status, you always have the big diamonds and the big stones. That has always existed, in recently centuries definitely. But there are so many more reasons for jewelry, for mourning and birth and good luck. That sort of exists today, probably with charms. So, jewelry is multifunctional.    Then we have a screen with pictures from different centuries showing portraits because, at a jewelry gallery, you can't see the pieces on someone. They need the body, but they don't have the body. So, it's good to have a screen showing how the jewelry was worn through the centuries, which is very important. Also in the display, each board—let's say you had earrings, a necklace and a bracelet. The concept was that what you wear on the top of the head goes on top. What you wear around your neck comes next and then the base, so you have a feeling of an abstract body in a way. It's not always obvious, but I try to think of it logically.    Of course, with the contemporary, we couldn't do that. It is all chronological until you get to about the 1950s, and that's it. You have to find a completely different concept. So, we decided to do it by materials. Good chronology at the beginning, but then it comes into materials. Natural materials, new metals, techniques. You couldn't do decades. That couldn't work. So, we did it by materials, which is an interesting aspect because you have all the different materials they use in comparison to all the gold and silver you see throughout the gallery. Suddenly, you're seeing a whole wall of completely different materials.   Sharon: What is your role as co-curator? You're curator and co-curator of so many places. What's your role as a co-curator? What do you do? What do they call in you for?   Beatriz: It's an advisory role. The Victoria and Albert Museum is a bit more than just an advisory role. You're working with the team, with the architect. It's a team procedure, but as I say, everybody has their own role to play. It intermingles, of course.    Sharon: At other times, you've talked about a different museum in Switzerland where you came, and it looked just—was it at eye level? Was it low? Was it too high?   Beatriz: Oh, that one, no. You remembered that detail. The eye level, that was the Victoria and Albert Museum. That is in the center of the gallery because we did a display for a tourist who goes to the museum and only has 10 minutes to look at jewelry history. So, in the center you've got these curved glass cases. The jewelry is on special mounts. You remember that. I asked my colleagues of different heights, from four foot something to six foot something. In the storage room, we had glass doors where there was a lot of storage space with artifacts in it, and I used Post-it Notes to put the different heights of people to see what a good eye level is. So, if you're looking at a broach or a tiara or something, you want it on the level where you more or less visualize it on your body so you can see it well. So, yes, that's the Post-it Notes. I used not only double-sided tape and pieces of paper, but also Post-it Notes, trying to find the right height for the pieces.    Eye level is hugely important, but the other museum you're thinking of may be something I'm current advising on. This is really an advisory role. It is a museum that will open next year, the Dubedeen, a German museum. Of course, there are gemologists there that are very specialized, but their museum experience is missing. So, I'm giving a little bit of advice on the background of things. Don't put a plinth that you can fall over. Don't make drawers that a child can get their fingers caught in. You learn these things from places like the Victoria and Albert Museum. There's health and safety. There's also the height of displays, the attention span of visitors. Text shouldn't be too long. It's more of an advisory role than an active role.   Sharon: I'm thinking about attention span. You must have seen that really go down. It seems nobody has more than two seconds for attention anymore.   Beatriz: There is an element of that. I think the Koch Collection of rings in the Jewelry Gallery is one of the most visited in the England museums. When you get to sparkle and glitter, there's more attention span, but not so much on the text.   Sharon: Yeah, that's probably true. You've also done a lot of work on shipwrecks. That's very interesting.   Beatriz: That goes back to 1989. By sheer coincidence, I came to work on shipwrecks. I was in New York when I was working on the Concepción Collection. I met Priscilla Muller of the Hispanic Society of America in New York, and I helped her with some Spanish and Portuguese jewelry. When she was asked, she just didn't have the time to work on the shipwrecks. She thought with my Spanish and Portuguese knowledge, I would be suited for that, so I was asked by Pacific Sea Resources in 1989 to work on an incredible shipwreck called the Nuestra Señora de la Concepción from 1638 that sank. It was the usual thing, mutiny and the wrong person taking care of the ship. That's a private story, not a jewelry story, but the interesting thing is that the jewelry was basically made for Spaniards in the Philippines. The jewelry was made in the Philippines, the majority of it for Spaniards. It was a Spanish colony at the time.   When I was first went through it, I thought, “It looks quite European. It looks O.K.” I signed the contract, and little did I know how much research was involved for the material, which I hardly knew. It was because of the influence. The Spaniards definitely had European design books they brought with them. By then, you had printed books with designs in them, and they must have had them there. Chinese craftsmen were working for them in the Philippines, and of course the Chinese had great skills with outside countries. Some of it looks very European, and some of it is Indian influences, Siamese influences, and influences from Java, Sumatra. The chains, heavy gold chains, were certainly Chinese filigree. In fact, I told the Ashmolean Museum it belonged to Sir Elias Ashmole, whose portrait and chains still exist in the Ashmolean Museum, and I told them that one of the gold chains he had was Chinese. It was given by the Kuffners from Brandenburg, and I happened to find out that the Kuffners from Brandenburg travelled to China. So, that all fit. That was a little like detective work. That was published in 1990.   I've recently been working again on shipwrecks, just a few pieces of absolutely fascinating jewelry found off the shore of the Bahamas, which has now been in the Maritime Museum on the Bahamas for only a few months. I also worked on the Atocha in Key West. I organized an exhibition in Hanover for them, where we did a display of the Atocha and Santa Margarita events. But what's so fascinating about shipwrecks is that we see so many portraits of beautiful jewelry from the Renaissance, the 16th, 17th centuries, where they really documented beautifully painted jewelry in paintings. Thanks to that we can study them in detail. All this jewelry doesn't exist anymore, especially gold chains, because gold chains were the easiest thing to melt and reuse for more modern jewelry. As I have said, I have a smile when somebody talks to me about recycled gold being something new. Well, it's nothing new. Recycling gold goes back centuries.    Sharon: I'm surprised because in the pictures, you always think it's a straightforward gold chain with no Chinese engraving or anything. You think of it as a gold chain.   Beatriz: Some of it is simple, what they called a P-chain. You saw loads of it, especially on Dutch paintings. But in the Atocha there was a spiral. You can see they're very tidy on the portraits, but it looks as if they had a spiral at the back holding the chain so they flowed down properly. Some of those chains we had were definitely Chinese filigree because those chains are filigree. In the 1655 shipwreck from the Bahamas, there's a chain like that, and that's mainly why they asked me to look at it. That certainly reminded me of some of the Concepción work, which was Chinese craftsmanship.    The trade was amazing. You had trade happening in the Philippines. Even the Dutch were trading with the Spaniards. The Dutch were trading silks and spices from China and so on. These big galleons went from the Philippines to Acapulco and Vera Cruz and then to Havana. They went on a route around South America, loading and offloading things from Europe. It's interesting because in Seville, there's the Archivo General de Indias, and there they have all the books on the shipping material. Like with the Atocha, they found out which ship it was because the gold bars have a text mark on them, and that coincided with the documents they have in Seville. It's fascinating. It's a fascinating field.   Sharon: It seems like it.   Beatriz: It's a mystery and it's global, of course. Made in Asia; there's nothing new. It's hundreds of years. There would not be any porcelain in 18th century Europe the other way around.   Sharon: Do you get to see the ship right away? When it comes up, do you see it when they pull it from the ocean?   Beatriz: No. When I was asked to work on the Concepción, I had to travel to Singapore where it was being cleaned and conserved. In one instance I had to say, “Stop cleaning because I think there's enamel underneath, black and white enamel. Stop.” You have to be careful because you have to get rid of the marine dirt. No, I got to see it after it was cleaned or while it was being cleaned.    Sharon: Wow! And then what? It goes to the museum? What happens afterwards?   Beatriz: It nearly got split up and sold at auction. I'm glad it didn't because it's a historical find, but unfortunately you have to go the Mariana Islands to see it. You can't see it always. The material is put together, and it was published in a black and white archaeological report. It was published in 1990, so at least it's documented. National Geographic did a beautiful spread with color, so you know what it's like.   Sharon: What have you learned from parsing these shipwrecks, from researching the shipwrecks?   Beatriz: The extent of influence in Europe of some motifs and how far they went. It was made in the Philippines and sold in Europe because everything that was made and transported on this galleon, the Atocha, at some point went to Seville and then it was traded on. We definitely know that the emeralds the emperors were after came from Colombia and then went through Havana to Seville. It's a fascinating trade, but the trade is something we never think about. In Roman times, the Roman emperor wanted pearls, so they traveled to southern India to get pearls. History does amaze one.    Sharon: It does. You're working on many projects now. What can you tell us about some of them?   Beatriz: I can tell you what's half-finished and what's coming. I've had a year of three books. I co-edited a book with Sandra Hindman, founder of Les Enluminures. I need to add Les Enluminures because for many years, I've been their jewelry consultant. They're based in Chicago, New York and Paris and are specialized mainly in Medieval and Renaissance jewelry, but this has nothing to do with the book we did. It just happened to be that we worked together again. Sandra and myself did something called a liber amicorum in honor of Diana Scarisbrick, a leading jewelry historian. It was for her 94th birthday, and we kept it a secret until her birthday. It had 20 authors in three languages all writing in her honor. That has come out. It's now available. It was published by Paul Holberton. It's on varied topics, from archaeology to today, really. 20 authors contributed towards that.    Today I received my copy of a book I worked on for the Schmuckmuseum, so it's now published. The launch is on Sunday, but I won't be traveling to Germany for that, unfortunately. It has to be a Zoom celebration for me. It's to do with the humanist Johann Reuchlin. He was from Pforzheim. He lived in the late 15th to the 16th century, and it's about script and jewelry from varying periods. It's a lot of contemporary jewelry as well. The cover doesn't really tell you that because it was the 500th anniversary of, I think, his death date. So, he was honored in this book, which has just come out, with essays from many people. Lots and lots of jewelry. That was published by Arnoldsche, and it's called—I have to think of it—German sounds so much easier in this case. It means script and pictures worn on the finger. I worked on rings with script on them.   Sharon: With writing you mean?   Beatriz: Yeah, writing, that's it. There are a lot of other topics in the book as well, but jewelry is certainly the dominant. Yes, they are rings. Mary Queen of Scotts is somebody who wrote her inscription inside the ring and was loyal to the queen. Had that been seen, her head would have gone to the chop. It's rings with prayers on them or rings with some sort of amuletic inscriptions. It's all inscriptions on rings in my case, and it's about Josiah Wedgwood who gave this ring to John Flaxman. You've got a whole history behind it. It's rings with script on them, highly visible on the bezel, either visible on the bezel or inside the hoop.   Sharon: In English or German?   Beatriz: It's basically German, I'm afraid to say, but with lots of good pictures with excellent captions, which are international. I am bilingual in German and English, but I haven't written German for a long time.    I've actually written a third book that's coming out, but that won't come out until January. That was a huge task. It's on jewelry from Bossard from Lucerne. It started in the early 19th century, but the two I worked on were a father and son from 1869 until 1934. That was the period of historicism. It was also a time of fakes of Renaissance jewelry being made, because there were so many collectors who wanted Renaissance but couldn't afford the real Renaissance jewelry. So, it was very tempting for fakers to make fake jewelry. When I started, I didn't know what I was in for, but I have come to the conclusion that it's pure historicism, what Bossard made. I had very little jewelry to go on, just a few pieces in private hands, but I did find by sheer coincidence a drawing, and I found the bishop who it belonged to. You have a hundred drawings by the Bossard Company over this whole period, and it's very interesting material to see their designs they were making. In some instances, it's real Renaissance. I don't know if they were Renaissance or if it was actually made later. Then it gets critical. It's a very complex period, but a very interesting archive in the Swiss National Museum in Zurich.   Sharon: For next year, do you have other projects going on?   Beatriz: Yes, the coming projects. I mentioned the gem museum, which is opening next year. I'm in the midst of advising. I'm going to be working very shortly—I've already started a bit—on the jeweler Eileen Coyne from London. She's been working on jewelry since the 1970s and continues to make jewelry very, very different to anything I've worked on before. What I find so fascinating is that her imagination and inspiration come from the material. It comes with the material and the tools. She also uses interesting gemstones and beads that come from ethnic backgrounds. She uses the most amazing materials. Also jades, carnelians, all kinds of things. So, we're going to do a book. She had a shop in the 80s and into the 90s. Her jewelry was displayed in Harvey Nichols in London, and she had a shop where all the celebrities and royals went shopping. It was quite an interesting clientele. We'll see if we get photographs or if they allow us to show some of the things they bought. It's very much about discretion in such cases. So, that's interesting, a completely different type of jewelry.    I'm really excited about it, but at the same time, I've also been involved, and am more involved now, in an artificial intelligence project. That is a ring that has been designed by Sylvia Reidenbach and John Emeny in England. Sylvia Reidenbach is German, but she teaches in Glasgow and London and all over Europe as well. She has created, with John Emeny, a ring with artificial intelligence based on one or two rings from the archaeological museum in Munich, a few rings from the  Germanisches Nationalmuseum in Nuremburg, and 150 rings from the Koch Collection. There's one design. The machine makes the design, mixes it all and combines it into one design. The ring is now being made. The stone is labradorite. It's been on display since Wednesday last week in the Germanisches Nationalmuseum but will be coming to Zurich afterwards. So, I'll be learning a lot about AI and design. That is completely different from anything. I like the natural materials and history, and then the contrast is the AI.   Sharon: The AI is the dimensions of all these hundreds of rings?   Beatriz: Yes, the images are put into the machine, the AI. Don't ask me the technology of it because I haven't got a clue about AI technology. I'm at the beginning of it all. I'm learning, but I have seen how it develops. The images are fed into the machine, like the 150 rings from the Koch Collection and the others, and the machine designs one ring out of that.   Sharon: Wow! So, it's already made and in the museum.   Beatriz: Only just now. It's hot off the press, but there's more to come on that. There will be more to come on that, yes.   Sharon: You've written several other books. You wrote “A Life in Jewels.”   Beatriz: That is the book we did for Diana Scarisbrick, honoring her. I've written books since 1981, so it's added up quite a bit. Sometime I can give you a list.    Sharon: How about the influence of women on 20th century jewelry? Has it changed jewelry? Has it made it more feminine?    Beatriz: It's an extremely complex story, the role of women in design. You have to see it from the role of the woman in history. Just recently by coincidence, I've seen some material on women painters from the 16th and 17th centuries. In Bologna, for example, there were quite a few, and it's only now coming to the fore. You also have to see high jewelers' workshops in the field of jewelry. You don't have a Renaissance piece of jewelry and know, “So-and-so made it.” That didn't exist. It's only in the 19th century that we start that. The hallmarking system in England goes back to the 13th century, but jewelry was considered smallware, so they didn't consider putting a hallmark on it.    That changed later on, the but the name of the designer is something that we very often don't know. The high jewelers of the 19th century, when you knew the name of who made it in Paris or New York, you never know the name of the designer. That is something that came in in the 20th century. You have some classical examples. With Cartier, it was Jeanne Toussaint. She designed some of the iconic pieces for Cartier and the Duchess of Windsor. She worked for I don't know how many decades designing jewelry. She was a very important female designer. Then you've got Coco Chanel. She designed jewelry, mostly costume jewelry, but she also designed diamond jewelry. Not that she wanted to, but it was for the nation and probably the economy that she did it. Elsa Schiaparelli, with her fantastic surrealist jewelry, made that incredible neckpiece with beetles in plastic. If you had to date that as a jewelry store and you didn't know the background, you'd easily say 1970s or 80s. It's so amazing. In that period, you also had Suzanne Belperron with her really unique designs in jewelry.    Of course, the role of the woman changed after the First World War. You had millions of widows, and they had to work. The whole society was changing. After the Second World War, it became even more evident that women were working. I was very cheeky. I did a lecture. It was in the British Museum, and I was talking about the changing role of men and women buying jewelry. You can imagine the shock of some of them. I said, “Women go out and buy their own jewelry.” Before it was classical: the husband bought the jewelry for the wife. They were the earners, so they bought it. There were a few examples in the early 1900s, like the Duchess of Manchester, whose tiaras are in the Victoria and Albert Museum. She was one of these Dollar Princesses and quite a character. She liked smoking cigars and all. She went off with the family diamonds to Cartier and said, “Make me a tiara, and use up the garments.” You have Lady Mountbatten, who, after the birth of her daughter, Pamela, decided to go to Cartier and buy herself a nice bracelet that she could also wear in her hair in the 1920s.    There are a few examples. On the whole, it was always the husband buying the jewelry, but past that, you have women earning money and buying their own jewelry. The 60s sets off in that direction, and then it becomes jewelry that's more affordable. Jewelry has never been so diverse as in the last decades. It's never been so diverse in all its history. If you look at the Royal College of Art, I think you'll find that, in general, there are a lot more women in training to become jewelers. You find so many names of women designers, now one doesn't even talk about it. Whether it's a man or a woman, it's just become a norm.    Sharon: That's interesting. If you stop to think about it, I don't even know if there are that many male designers. I'm thinking about when I go to studios. You see more women than you do men.   Beatriz: It's more and more, yes. There are more and more women, absolutely.   Sharon: What would you advise? What piece of advice would you give emerging jewelers or people who want to follow in your steps?   Beatriz: Remember that if you're a jewelry historian, you're an academic. Remember that. You have to really enjoy what you're doing. In my case, I was very lucky. I've worked for so many different projects and so many different jewelers internationally. I've specialized in that, but it's very difficult. Maybe, depending on the economic situation, people can volunteer in a museum to learn the trade. I think what you really have to know is do you want to work in a gallery, or do you want to work in an auction? Do you want to work in a museum? They don't always mingle, so you have to learn where you want to go. It depends on what your interests are. If you have anybody, send them to me privately. I'm happy to talk it through.   Sharon: Thank you for being with us.   Beatriz: My pleasure.   Sharon: Well will have photos posted on the website. Please head to TheJewelryJourney.com to check them out.   Thank you again for listening. Please leave us a rating and review so we can help others start their own jewelry journey.

What you'll learn in this episode:   How Beatriz discovered and catalogued the 2,600 rings in the Alice and Louis Koch Ring Collection at the Swiss National Museum How Covid lockdown changed how people wear jewelry Beatriz's tricks for making a jewelry exhibit more engaging What it's like to work with jewels uncovered from shipwrecks How global trade has influenced how jewelry is designed and made   About Beatriz Chadour-Sampson   Beatriz Chadour-Sampson studied art history, classical archaeology and Italian philology at the University of East Anglia, and at the University of Münster, Germany. Her doctoral thesis was on the Italian Renaissance goldsmith Antonio Gentili da Faenza. In 1985 she published the jewelry collection of the Museum für Angewandte Kunst, Cologne. Since 1988 she has worked freelance as a jewelry historian, curator of exhibitions and academic writer in Britain. Her numerous publications on jewelry, ranging from antiquity to the present day, include the The Gold Treasure from the Nuestra Señora de la Concepción (1991), and 2000 Finger Rings from the Alice and Louis Koch Collection, Switzerland (1994). She was the consultant curator in the re-designing of the William and Judith Bollinger Jewelry Gallery at the Victoria & Albert Museum (opened in 2008), London and was guest curator of the ‘Pearl' exhibition (2013-14). She is an Associate Member of the Goldsmiths' Company, London. Today Beatriz Chadour-Sampson works as a freelance international and jewelry historian and scholarly author. Her extensive publications range from Antiquity to the present day.    Additional Resources: Instagram Museum Jewellery Curators - Goldsmiths' Fair Inside the Jewel Vault with Dr Beatriz Chadour-Sampson Photos available on TheJeweleryJourney.com Transcript:   Working in jewelry sometimes means being a detective. As a freelance jewelry historian and curator of the Alice and Louis Koch Ring Collection at the Swiss National Museum, Beatriz Chadour-Sampson draws on her wealth of knowledge to find jewelry clues—even when a piece has no hallmark or known designer. She joined the Jewelry Journey Podcast to talk about how she creates jewelry exhibits that engage viewers; how she found her way into the niche of shipwreck jewelry; and what it was like to catalogue 2,600 rings. Read the episode transcript here.    Sharon: Hello, everyone. Welcome to the Jewelry Journey Podcast. This is the first part of a two-part episode. Please make sure you subscribe so you can hear part two as soon as it's released later this week. My guest today is Beatriz Chadour-Sampson. She's been the curator of the Alice and Louis Koch Ring Collection at the Swiss National Museum for almost 35 years. She's also a jewelry historian, art historian, educator, author and a whole bunch of other things I'm sure I'm missing out on, but she'll fill us in today. Beatriz, welcome to the program.   Beatriz: Thank you very much for your invitation.   Sharon: Can you tell us about your jewelry journey? It's been quite a journey.   Beatriz: Yes, the journey starts many years ago when I was a small child, in fact. I'm not a young chick at the moment, but I started off in my childhood with jewelry. I have to tell you a little bit of the family history. I was born in Cuba. My father was Russian and my mother was British. There's a whole story of European history, including being five times refugees from Europe within Europe. That's the aside, but my father learned how to cut and polish diamonds during the war in Cuba. After the war, he opened an import/export business for gemstones. It's not unknown. You'll probably find on the internet a picture of me, age three, sorting stones in his office in Cuba. We left Cuba during the Cuban Revolution. I was a Cuban subject as well as my father, but we left and never returned.    He opened a business called Chadour Charms, Inc. in New York. I always spent my holidays in New York. My mother was working in a company where I couldn't tag along. I spent most of my free time as a child on 47th Street, which was called the gold and diamond alley at the time. My father designed charms. He had the gold cast and then set the stones himself. On 47th Street we had many friends we visited. One had a refinery for gold and silver; the other one sold supplies for goldsmiths, which was quite exciting. I encountered pearls, corals, diamonds and all sorts of jewelry experiences.    That was from three years to early childhood. It was about three years altogether in New York. Then my father was offered a job in Frankfurt am Main in Germany. He spoke fluent German. It was an American company building a pearl business in Frankfurt. That's when I got even deeper into jewelry. Of course, there was also the trade. You can call it child labor today. In those days maybe it was seen slightly differently, but I did my homework with the secretaries. After that, I was stringing pearls, writing invoices and doing all kinds of things with pearls. When I was slightly older, I was allowed to make pearl pairs. Don't think that a pearl is white. It's nowhere near white. There are so many different colors and lusters that come in the pearl. So, I was setting pearls, hundreds of pearls, sorting them by a quarter of a millimeter, and then pairing them for earrings and matching the pearls in their luster so they could be worn as earrings.   From there we went on to jewelry, so stones and charms. Something interesting with the charms—I have a little anecdote. I was researching a book, “The Power of Love,” which came out in 2019, and I was looking in an auction catalogue for a famous love ring that Sir Laurence Olivier gave to the actress Vivian Leigh. Late at night, as I do very often, I was searching on the internet for the auction catalogue, and suddenly I see a charm bracelet. I couldn't believe my eyes. One of the charms she had on the bracelet was designed by my father. I can prove that because I have the same charm on my charm bracelet. It was a ship in the sunset, as you see in the background. So, that was going down memory lane.    When I reached the age of 18, I said, “I don't want to have anything to do with jewelry ever again.” I had enough. I grew up in the jewelry trade. It was all trade. Lo and behold, I then decided to study art history in Germany and England, but I did my thesis in Germany at the University of Münster. My subject at the end of this was Antonio Gentili, a Renaissance goldsmith. He came from Faenza. He worked for the Medici and the Farnese families, two very high families. He also did works for the Vatican. I remember in my early years after my dissertation, I used to see the Easter Mass on television in Germany. I was looking to see if the cross and candlesticks I worked on were on the show on the altar, which most years they were.    I then got into goldsmiths' work. It's through my jewelry background and my thesis on Renaissance goldsmiths' work that I was awarded a scholarship to write the catalogue of 900 pieces of jewelry for what is now called the Museum for Applied Arts, the Museum für Angewandte Kunst. The collection covers 5,000 years of jewelry history. I was really plunged into the deep history of jewelry. There weren't so many books at the time. They were more archaeology books. This explosion of jewelry books is something that came after I had finished the catalogue. There was a lot of research that was quite complex, but I enjoyed it. It was wonderful to gain that experience and knowledge of a wide part of jewelry history. That was in 1981. I finished the catalogue. It was published. That was also my first experience doing an exhibition because when the catalogue was launched, we had an exhibition with the jewelry. More recently I've been with the Cologne Museum since 1981. It was the first time. They're now doing a new display of the jewelry. They're still planning it. I think it's due to come out next year, so there will be a new display of the jewelry I catalogued.    Then I was offered a job in Hanau, Germany. Many will not realize that Hanau has a history in jewelry that goes back to the 17th century. Up to the First World War, it was a center for producing hand-manufactured jewelry. Today, they have an academy where you can learn how to make jewelry. That goes back to 1772. So, it's a city of great tradition of jewelry. I was Managing Director of the Gesellschaft für Goldschmiedekunst. I was organizing exhibitions and competitions and catalogues, and it was all contemporary jewelry.  When I was working in Cologne, that was my first encounter with contemporary jewelry. I met people who I became great friends with. I also took part in the many events of the Forum für Schmuck und Design, which still exists. So, those were my early experiences with contemporary jewelry, but when I got to Hanau, I was plunged right into it. I had all kinds of jobs to do, as I said, exhibitions, catalogues and competitions.    I stayed there for about three and a half years. In 1988, I was asked if I would catalogue the Alice and Louis Koch Collection. Louis Koch was a very famous jeweler in Frankfurt au Main, Germany, and he and his wife collected rings, among many other collections. It was a family of collections. By 1904, they had about 1,700 rings. There are over 2,600 rings now. I was asked to catalogue the 1,700 rings, which took me quite a long time, but I was doing all kinds of other projects in between. The collector allowed me to do that, which was great fun. In 1994, the historical collection was catalogued fully. It's like an encyclopedia of rings from ancient Egypt on. It covers 4,000 years of jewelry history.   In about 1993, just before we finished the catalogue—and there are a few contemporary rings in the 1994 publication. I believe this collection from Louis Koch in 1904 went to a second and a third generation after he died in 1930. The fourth generation, we discussed it, and we came to the conclusion that they should make it their own and continue where their great-grandfather had finished. Now, their great-grandfather was, as I said, a very famous family jeweler in Frankfurt. The shop was called the Cartier of Germany, so you can imagine royalty wearing it and the national business. He was a quite a jeweler. They also expanded to Baden-Baden. He was a very fashionable jeweler, and he was a contemporary of René Lalique. He didn't buy rings from any other contemporaries, but he bought a ring by René Lalique, so he must have realized there was something very contemporary about Lalique. He was the modernizer of French jewelry at the time, using glass and gold that was unthinkable.    So, we went on this venture from 1993 until the publication in 2019. We amassed a collection of 610 rings from the 20th and 21st century, which are all catalogued. Then the collection went into the Swiss National Museum. There was a small exhibition, but since 2019, there's a permanent display of 1,700 rings. May I add that the 610 contemporary rings are all on display, so we reduced repetitions within the historical part of the collection. Interestingly, this room's showcase is also round like a ring. With 1,700 rings, it's not an easy task because you have to go in a circle. We had big, brown panels of paper and played around with the rings. It starts with themes and then goes on chronologically to the contemporary. You couldn't make a mistake because once you got to ring 200, you couldn't go back to number 50. You can imagine going up to 1,700. I can say there are two rings that are not in the right place, but that's not too bad with 1,700 rings.   Sharon: Did you have to photograph them?   Beatriz: I'm very lucky to finish up on the Koch Collection. I'm now consultant curator to the Swiss National Museum in Zurich. I was responsible for the display there together with my colleagues in the museum. That was quite an experience. It's wonderful after 35 years to still be able to do this. I think they were a bit concerned about my babies and that I would want to run away from it, but that isn't the case. I really enjoy working with them. It's a pleasure. It's so rewarding, after 35 years, to see the collection on display, which was always in private hands from the 1900s onward.   I've just written six blogs for the Swiss National Museum. One is on the Napoleonic Wars, and the stories are all told by the rings. The next one coming out in November is on Josiah Wedgwood and his sculptor, John Flaxman. Rings tell lots of stories.   Sharon: Are the blogs in English?    Beatriz: Everything in the Swiss National Museum is English, German, French and Italian. So, you take your pick which one you want.   Sharon: Did you have to photograph everything? When you say you catalogued them, I think of a catalogue being a photograph and description.   Beatriz: Oh, no. The photographs of the historical collection were all done by a photographer. It's very difficult because we had to choose one background for all. That was complex. It's pre-1994, so it's sort of an old, pale, gray blue. One color fits all because it was the encyclopedic nature of the books.    With the 2019 book, I was working with the photographer in Zurich. I spent many weeks and months in Zurich sitting next to the photographer and choosing which angle because contemporary rings don't just have a hoop and a bezel. It's a piece of sculpture, so you have to know exactly which angle to take the photograph to show as much as you can of the ring. I was actually working together with the photographer. You learn a lot with such jobs.    Sharon: Wow! Today there are all kinds of degrees you can get with exhibitions. Was it something you learned hands on or learned by doing?   Beatriz: I was working at the practice in my second home of the Victoria and Albert Museum, because I was consultant curator to the William and Judith Bollinger Jewelry Gallery. I worked there for four and a half years on the displays. When you see the displays in the gallery, the concept was from me. I had little black and white photographs of the old gallery, nothing in color. It didn't matter that I knew the pieces by heart and each piece of jewelry was about the size of a small fingernail, and I got a damp hand from cutting out 4,000 images of 4,000 pieces of jewelry, very high-tech, of course. I had my pieces of paper, and I started thinking that every board has to tell a story. For me with an exhibition, the exhibit has to tell the story, and the text below on the captions really helps you understand it. Visually, I think it's very important that the pieces also talk. So, yes, I started before the architect was allocated and we worked together with 4,000 pieces. My colleague, Richard H. Cumber, worked on the watches, but otherwise all the jewelry is designed on black and white photographs on white sheets of paper with double-sided tape.   Sharon: Do you have thoughts about why you got so immersed in jewelry? You said you didn't want anything to do with jewelry, but here you are immersed in it. What were your thoughts?   Beatriz: You mean deep diving in it?   Sharon: Yes.   Beatriz: I grew up in the jewelry trade and experienced the Cuban Revolution and hardships, being refugees in New York and so on and then moving again to another country. It was complex. As a child, it wasn't quite easy. It didn't do me any harm. I've survived, but it was a really hard trade. What I was doing later, and still do now, is historical jewelry. It's a very different thing. I think I've gotten my love of jewelry back, yes, but I'm very keen on the wide picture of jewelry covering thousands of years.    In fact, I've been doing courses for the Victoria and Albert Museum since 2008. When I do the “Bedazzled” one, which is a history of jewelry, I start with 150,000 B.C. I jump off it pretty quickly, but for me, it's so important for people to go back to that time to understand what jewelry was about. To me, it was certainly more amuletic rather than status. It was status as well probably. We can't follow that, but certainly I think amuletic to protect from the dangers. They lived in a very natural world, so the dangers were much worse than we could imagine. I think it's fascinating to see what was in other periods of jewelry history. It makes it much more exciting to understand what's happening now.   Sharon: When you came to contemporary jewelry—it seems that you're pretty immersed in that also—what stood out to you? What made a piece different or jump out at you? There seems to be so much copycatting in many ways.   Beatriz: Definitely, a lot of copycatting. I've worked on a collection of 450 pieces of, and I can tell you that's one of the most copied ones. On Instagram, I have to be careful that I don't get nasty remarks because I do point out, “Yes, we've seen that before. He was ahead of his time, but his style is still modern today.” When we were putting the Koch Collection together with the 610 rings, 20 from the 21st century, the individual l idea was very important for me. It has to be innovative; the idea has to be new; it has to be interesting. For the materials, it should be an experiment with new materials; different materials; materials you wouldn't use for jewelry. We talk about sustainable jewelry. Pre-1994 we have two rings in the collection made of washing-up bottles. We were way ahead of the times. Of course, Peter Chang used recycled materials, and we commissioned a ring from him. We did commission people that never made rings before just to put them to the test. It was very interesting.   Sharon: I didn't know that Peter Chang was recycled.   Beatriz: The materials are all recycled materials, yes. That is the amazing part, the recycled materials. These two crazy rings we bought from a German jeweler, it's just washing-up bottles. If you're creative and imaginative, you make something interesting.    We have many important names who made rings. We have some wonderful rings from Wendy Ramshaw and so on. We have a lot of big names, but that was not the point. We have a lot of ones that just graduated or were young or completely unknown. It's more the idea and what they made. Of course, I was approached many times regarding rings and I had to decline, saying, “Sorry, we already have something like that.” I couldn't say it was not exciting. The idea was already there, so it makes it difficult. Unless it was interpreted differently, yes, that's fine.    So, I think we got a lot of crazy pieces. The collector always teased me. He said, “Can you wear the ring?” I said, “Of course, could you wear the ring? What do you think?” I always choose rings for wearing. Of course, I have to admit there are a few that are not wearable. I'll admit to that, but I think with a collection like the Koch Collection, you're allowed to do that. There are few you really can't wear, or you can wear them with great difficulty.   Sharon: Yes, I think about that. I always think about how it would be to type with a ring like that, or how it would be to work at a keyboard, something like that.   Beatriz: I always say you don't wear the big, high jewelry pieces when you go shopping or washing up.   Sharon: That's true.   Beatriz: I won't say any company names, but the high jewelers of New York, Paris, wherever, they make those pieces. Those are rings. If they look great, they're wearable, but you wouldn't wear them every day while you're washing up or shopping or doing other tasks around the house.   Sharon: That's true. That's probably why people don't buy them as much anymore. They don't have places to go, Covid aside.   Beatriz: I think with Covid, the interesting thing is that we have rings that are sculptures. If you're doing a collection and somebody makes a ring sculpture, I think it's valid to be in the Koch Collection. We do have a few ring sculptures, including Marjorie Schick. But it's interesting that you mentioned Covid and when the pandemic was on. I don't want to go into the pandemic, but we have a much-increased Zoom culture. It did exist before the pandemic, people trying to reduce travelling and climate change and so on. It did come before the pandemic, but it is definitely an increased media. You can't really wear a ring and say, “Well, here's my ring.” You have to wear something that's in the Zoom zone. That's earrings and brooches. Fortunately, I'm somebody who likes earrings and brooches. I always have on earrings and brooches.   Sharon: What you have on is very Zoom culture. It shows up well.   Beatriz: The color shows up, yes. The earrings, they're made of silver and made by Eve Balashova, who works in Glasgow. Zoom is not a problem with this jewelry because, as I said, I love the earrings and certainly the brooch that goes with it. In fact, when I bought the earrings I asked, “Can you make a brooch I can wear with it?”    Sharon: Wow! When you go out, do you see rings that make you say, “That should be in the collection”? Can you add new ones?   Beatriz: Since the display in 2019, there are only a few additions. It sort of finished with the publication and the display, but there have been the odd new rings. I write a lot about that. We have had a few, and I'm hoping that next year they will be on display. Maybe half a dozen rings; not many. We might have another exciting one, but we have to wait. Until the collector has actually gotten his hands on it, I don't want to jinx things.    Sharon: But you identify them and then they say yea or nay.   Beatriz: Yes. They have bought things on their own as well, but we've done this together, yes. I've identified and advised. For me, it was wonderful. First of all, they don't know the collector. It's always the Koch Collection, but the family's name is different, so it was always very modest, without great names. I was the one who negotiated everything, and it always gave me great pleasure when I could stand up and say, “We've chosen a ring for the collection.” You find this great joy on the other end, especially for those young or unknown ones. You could imagine what it meant for them. It's always great joy.    I love working with contemporary artist jewelers. I worked for 13 years as a visiting tutor under David Watkins. I always said I learned more from them than they learned from me, but I helped them with their Ph.Ds. I really enjoyed working with them, and it continued with being able to buy or acquire what they made for the collection.   Sharon: You do a lot of teaching. You're teaching other classes in January at the V&A.   Beatriz: Yeah.   Sharon: It started online.   Beatriz: Yes. In 2021, I did an online course, “Bedazzled.” Next year, in January and February, it's called “Jewels of Love, Romance and Eternity,” which is a topic I've worked on because I published the book “Proud Love.” We have a few other speakers who can bring another slant into it. Again, I start with antiquity, because you can't talk about love jewels without actually talking about Roman jewelry. Many people don't realize that the engagement ring or the proposal ring or marriage ring started with the ancient Romans.   Sharon: I didn't know that.   Beatriz: Diamonds in engagement rings started in the 15th century. It might be a little bit earlier, but that's more or less the dateline. So, there are lots of interesting things to talk about.    As I said, I've been doing courses since 2008 at regular intervals. Also at the Victoria and Albert Museum, I was co-curator of the pearls exhibition. I did a lot of courses on pearls as well, and that is a fascinating topic. It was wonderful to work on that exhibition. It was together with the Qatar Museum's authority, but I was asked by the Victoria and Albert Museum to create an exhibition for the British public, which was very different to what they had in mind, of course.   Sharon: There are so many new kinds of pearls, or at least kinds that weren't popular before. Tahitians and yellow pearls, that sort of thing.   Beatriz: Yes, all these extra pearls are the cultured pearls. It's a history of the natural pearl. Qatar was a center where they were diving for pearls, so we did all the diving history, how merchants worked in that area in Bali and Qatar. The cultured pearl is, of course, Mikimoto. There are theories that the Chinese started the cultured pearls, but the one who really got the cultured pearls going was Mikimoto. He certainly did the science with it. He worked together with scientists and had the vision. Natural pearls were very, very expensive, and his philosophy was that every woman should wear a pearl necklace or be able to afford a pearl necklace. I think his task is fulfilled.   It's interesting because the natural pearl doesn't have quite the luster of the cultured pearl. By the 20s, you have the cultured pearls coming in, and then by the 50s—when I did the exhibition, we had so many stories being told. Of course, some ladies from the Middle East are probably kicking themselves because they sold the family natural pearls because they didn't have the luster, and they bought the nice cultured pearls that are more flashy. Of course, now the value of natural pearls is unthinkable.   Sharon: Was there a catalogue?    Beatriz: With cultured pearls, you have the golden pearls and the Tahitian pearls and so on, but the color of the pearls depends on the shell they grow in, unless you have some that have been tampered with and are colored. But there are Tahitian pearls, golden pearls and all these different shades. Melo pearls have an orangey color. The color of the pearl is dependent on the shell it grows in. The rarest pearl is the pink pearl that comes from the Caribbean. That's the conch pearl; that's hugely expensive. You asked about the catalogue.   Sharon: We will have photos posted on the website. Please head to TheJewelryJourney.com to check them out.

Transcript -- What factors should you consider when working with particular demographics?

Transcript -- The challenges psychologists face with this type of research.

Transcript -- Working from home and in the office.

Transcript -- Working across national boundaries and with multi-cultural groups is a skilled activity. Some of the required skills are learned, through experience and study, but others are more innate. In this podcast we will break down the ways that multinational organizations are measuring these skills, and we will hear from the managers and academics who have practical advice to dispense.

Transcript -- Shazia and Yusef met on the internet and have been together ever since. They discuss living and working together and how their relationship continues to evolve.

Transcript -- Shazia and Yusef met on the internet and have been together ever since. They discuss living and working together and how their relationship continues to evolve.

Transcript: Working early in the twentieth century physicist Marie Curie was able to show that radioactive processes released millions of times more energy per atom than any chemical process known. Marie Curie was a pioneer. With her husband she was the first to isolate a radioactive element. She was the first female professor in the six hundred year history of the Sorbonne. She was the first person ever to win two Nobel Prizes; however Marie and many others who worked on radioactivity paid heavily for being pioneers. Unaware of the damaging effects of radiation on human skin and tissue they died from radioactive poisoning.

Transcript -- A short introduction to this album.

Transcript -- A short introduction to this album.

Transcript -- A short introduction to this album.

Transcript -- A short introduction to this album.

Transcript -- Partnerships require both strict accountability and a spirit of compromise from the various participants.

Transcript -- Partnerships require both strict accountability and a spirit of compromise from the various participants.

Transcript -- Joan Devlin on how Belfast Healthy Cities is a model for further partnership initiatives.

Transcript -- These discussions examine the rights and lives of older people, firstly by looking at the work of rights group Age Concern, secondly by spotlighting the disturbing prevalence of elder abuse.

Transcript -- An introduction to this album’s content

Transcript -- An introduction to this album’s content

Transcript -- Working life is increasingly about working wherever you can plug in your laptop, allowing flexibility and autonomy.

Transcript -- Working life is increasingly about working wherever you can plug in your laptop, allowing flexibility and autonomy.

Transcript -- Julie Stein is midwife. This track focuses on the work she expects in her day-to-day life and how policy can affect her employment and workload

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Transcript -- A brief introduction to this album.

Transcript -- The history and background of Middleton based multidisciplinary care scheme MERIT

Transcript -- Working with the community to improve individual and community welfare.

Transcript -- The history and background of Middleton based multidisciplinary care scheme MERIT

Transcript -- Working with the community to improve individual and community welfare.

Transcript -- Akkas recounts the story of his involvement with The Factory Project, how it's led to better prospects, and how his Bengali ethnicity means he can bridge cultural gaps.

Transcript -- Akkas recounts the story of his involvement with The Factory Project, how it's led to better prospects, and how his Bengali ethnicity means he can bridge cultural gaps.

Transcript -- Estelle discusses issues within the field of mental health.

Transcript -- The holistic solution to mental health as explained by Estelle.

Transcript -- Social workers at a Mental Health centre in Lithuania talk about their qualifications and why they became social workers and what their work involves at the centre.

Transcript -- Amanda Mihaly talks about differences and tensions between social workers and school staff, and the problems of being grant funded.

Transcript -- A Wendy Monks, a social worker, explains her role in the team describing her work at Wychavon and the various challenges that it represents

Transcript -- A social Worker at a psychiatric hospital talks about why she became a social worker.