Hello,
Ted has given you some good suggestions for visiting Birmingham, UK.
You can google Jewellery Quarter Birmingham, UK and find some sites
that will help you locate things of interest. In addition to Ted's
suggestion of the Jewellery Museum (check on tour times, and call or
go early to reserve a time), I suggest that you go to the Jewellery
School on Vittoria Street----a wonderful school with 13 studios! You
should call ahead to see if you can get shown around. They usually
have a lot of lovely student stuff on display. In fact, check the
web site---maybe there'll be a "short course" (Brit for workshop)
that you can take!
Next door and down the alley is Sutton Tools (they carry the
Eid-Longhi Anticlastic Stakes---tell them I sent you!). Across the
street is Cookson. On the corner is another tool store, and across
the square, near a great coffee and tea place is Walsh's. It's fun to
see what is the same, and what is different there.
Go for a walk along the canal. Sit in a caf=e along the canal and
watch for a barge to go through a lock.
Go to the Birmingham Museum of Art. There's an interesting-sounding
show on of " the little-known subject of "lover's eyes," hand-painted
miniatures of single human eyes set in jewelry and given as tokens of
affection or remembrance. In 1785, when the Prince of Wales secretly
proposed to Mrs. Maria Fitzherbert with a miniature of his own eye,
he inspired an aristocratic fad for exchanging eye portraits mounted
in a wide variety of settings including brooches, rings, lockets, and
toothpick cases."
Cynthia Eid
http://www.cynthiaeid.com
