A JEWELLER, AN ILLUSTRATOR AND A PHOTOGRAPHER COME TOGETHER IN A CREATIVE COLLABORATION THAT'S GOOD FOR THE SOUL
London, June 2019, and I’m at New Designers to exhibit my work. These kinds of shows always have a beautiful sense of community. There are incredible ceramicists, jewellers and makers everywhere you look.
You'll often spend plenty of time chatting to other exhibitors at this kind of thing but I had no idea that this time, it would be the start of a really exciting project. Here’s how my recently launched jewellery collection came into being and the lessons I learnt along the way.
The creative collaboration gets off the ground in London
Laura Williams of Kinley Jewellery had the stand opposite mine at New Designers and that’s how we got talking. She’s a designer with the kind of attention to detail and exquisite taste that makes you instantly want to be friends and by the end of the show we'd come up with a wild idea... What if we combined her craftsmanship with my naked ladies in a brand new jewellery range?
Weeks passed, emails flew, photos exchanged. Laura was re-creating curvaceous shapes in lines of wire, adding touches of solid gold and silver in all the right places. For both of us, a learning curve in the other person’s discipline as we tweaked, re-invented and re-worked our brand new idea.
Unlike so many working relationships where things are forced or no-one says what they really mean, our friendship got stronger. I believe that we’ve created a product line that’s so much the better for the strength of honesty that went into it.
Next step, photography. I had just the woman in mind for the next part of this creative collaboration.
Cape Town illustrator meets Cape Town photographer
Like me, Claire Vögeli had been based in Cape Town before moving to London. I’d been following her on Instagram for a while, impressed by her work around female empowerment and body positivity.
We came together at my flat in London for the product photoshoot and as I suspected, Claire turned out to be way more than just a photographer. She’s a total powerhouse of a woman.
On the day of the shoot I was ready with some props I’d made but honestly, I knew I was faffing. I showed the things I’d done to Claire and in that moment, she was so gracious and encouraging. She was completely open to my plans but she’d also brought her expertise and decisiveness along.
She intuitively seemed to know which prop and product to put where and as she worked, taking my own ideas into consideration, something even better than what I’d imagined began to emerge.
So here’s what I learnt through creative collaboration
i) Find some common ground
I’m pretty sure that the best collaborations start out with people who share some common ground in terms of values and what they believe in. Work this out before you start.
ii) Fear will kill collaboration every time
When you reach out to collaborate, there’s always a fear of rejection. There’s always the possibility that the person you really want to work with is going to turn you down. My lesson here was to lean in, feel the fear, do the asking and not let a potential ‘no’ get in the way of what might be beautiful.
iii) Above all, you need to trust yourself
We might think that someone else has better ideas, that they’ve discovered the “right” way to do things while we’re still second-guessing ourselves. This project reminded me of what I already knew; you need to go with your gut and trust your ideas.
Looking at everyone else is the path to distraction and inadequacy. Trying the thing that’s in your head and your heart, even if it doesn’t work, is the path to being unique and genuine.
So, if you ask me, am I up for another creative collaboration? HECK, YES.
If you’ve got an idea, just reach out to me here.
“Looking at everyone else is the path to distraction and inadequacy. Trying the thing that’s in your head and your heart, even if it doesn’t work, is the path to being unique and genuine.”
