Cynthia Eid visits Bristol UK

A while ago Cynthia Eid asked UK Orchidians for interesting things
to do at the weekend while she was teaching at the School of
Jewellery in Birmingham. We were delighted when Cynthia agreed to
visit ACJ-Bristol.

The Association for Contemporary Jewellery (ACJ) is a bit like SNAG,
but being Britain it is smaller.

We have a very active regional group down here, ACJ-Bristol, which
you may remember from our well received 2004 Jewellery-Unlimited
exhibition - a national ACJ show of cutting edge work (see
http://www.jewellery-unlimited.org.uk)

Our secretary Chris Pate has a lovely 17th century farmhouse, and a
well-equipped teaching studio (Touchmark Studio) which hosted the
day. A thorough powerpoint presentation showed us the benefits and
uses of Argentium silver (which is not yet commonly used in the UK
despite having been invented here by Peter Johns at Middlesex
University). After a fabulous lunch, a hallmark of ACJ-Bristol
events, Cynthia gave us a practical demonstration of annealing,
fusing, and soldering of Argentium. A barrage of questions and
discussion followed, and Cynthia was most generous with her expert

This was also Bristol’s Harbour Festival weekend, so we had
fireworks in the evening.

ACJ is building a new website, will post again when this is up. In
the meantime, visit http://www.acj.org.uk for more on
our activities.

Thanks Cynthia for a great and inspiring visit!
Tamizan