Ceramic is the new black

Materials | Fashion Jewellery | Fashion Accessories | Europe

Ceramic is the new black

05 Dec 2011

Designers and industry practitioners are tending increasingly to create jewellery pieces out of something ordinary; they love adding contemporary twists to traditional materials and turning them into a one-of-a-kind pieces that connect people. Ceramic jewellery is no longer confined merely to ceramic beads; it has come to have more forms and details, making it more playful. Six ceramic jewellery designers from China, Israel, Netherlands, United Kingdom and United States share their views with AFJA Review.

Ceramic beads moving forward

Customers are becoming more fashion-savvy these days. They look for statement pieces that represent themselves more than just standard fashion jewellery. And their preferences have also changed. “In fact, ceramic jewellery includes not only ceramic beads, but also other forms. Animal- or flower-shaped ceramic parts can also be made into pendants, rings, brooches, earrings, bracelets etc,” Delia Jin of Vode Tino Artistic Jewellery Design and Industry Co Ltd in China said. She pointed out that customers chose beads in the past, but nowadays they are more into something special or with a unique design. “Also, there is huge development of ceramic jewellery in terms of its glaze, decals, paintings and designs.”

Indeed, developments in technology and chemistry have brought ceramics into new niches; ceramic and plaster 3D printing know-how is available for the manufacture of forms and models that were impossible in the past. Kilns are more time-efficient and temperatures are more controllable, ensuring better quality. Israeli ceramic jewellery designer Daniel Zelig highlighted that “Glazes can produce wonderful exotic effects; decals come in different dimensions, colours and textures as well.”


Vode Tino Artistic	Shayla Cox	Daniel Zelig

In the meantime, some customers have started looking for ceramic jewellery which does not focus on beads, as American jewellery designer Shayla Cox commented. Yet whether using beads or other ceramic forms, the challenge is to keep the jewellery wearable, comfortable and durable. Always amazed by its organic nature, Ms Cox mingles elements of modern architecture and interior design into her fashion jewellery pieces; one of her recent works is a collection of six pieces made for Donna Karan’s Urban Zen Store in Sag Harbour, New York.

In fact, perceptions of ceramic jewellery among customers have been changing. “Ceramic jewellery was once perceived as old-fashioned, but that view is changing. Younger designers are coming up with more innovative designs, using traditional materials in new ways and increasing their appeal to a younger market,” said Ruth Robinson of United Kingdom-based Ruth Robinson Ceramics.


Ruth Robinson	Harriet Damave	Veronica Buttons

Embracing its raw composition

“Clay just gives me free rein to create. Inspired by nature, ceramics is the ideal medium for expressing natural forms and structures. That applies particularly to porcelain, which can be rolled paper-thin to the point of translucency, while thicker porcelain can be used to produce pieces with surprising strength,” Ms Robinson said. Blue glazed bird brooches are her most popular designs, followed very closely by her “Kiwis” pieces. Most of the kiwis are sold to collectors in America and Canada. .

Similarly, Ms Zelig is very fond of the organic nature of ceramic. She allows plenty of room in his pieces for designs by purposely leaving the jewellery “white.” Ceramic has a huge advantage; it has no specific dimensions or permanent colour. To Ms Zelig, visual clarity and highly detailed finish are the core elements.

She added that customers nowadays wear jewellery that has meaning for them. For many, her necklace “Keys” symbolises a childhood memory – many children wear keys around their necks after they finish school and before parents return, so that they can go outside any time they want; the necklace carries an emotional attachment for those children after they grow up.

All the designers actually love the characteristic of fragility ceramic brings to a piece, making it so challenging and uncommon. Ms Robinson pointed out the much greater difficulty of applying glaze to smaller pieces, where fine detail is easily lost; whereas larger pieces are more prone to warp or crack during the firing process.

Designers’ organic flair

Dutch jewellery designer Harriet Damave appreciates the “rawness” of ceramic that allows every single piece to be individual and unique. Ms Damave’s jewellery is known for her Delft blue glazing technique, which has deep, centuries-old roots in the Netherlands.


Harriet Damave	Ruth Robinson	Veronica Buttons

“I’m very attached to my owl pieces; their whimsical little faces suggest a mid-20th century feel and carry hints of my favourite Scandinavian ceramic designers. Its fragile nature truly makes ceramic jewellery interesting.”

On the other hand, Laura Walker, founder of Veronica Buttons in the United Kingdom, makes good use of the company’s niches in embroidery and creates her “stitch-themed” ceramic jewellery buttons. “‘Alice in Wonderland’ is my new ceramic jewellery collection; the pieces are difficult to develop and I had to make myself some special tools to handle them and produce their current lovely look,” Ms Walker explained. Apart from her stitch theme, she also uses threads and fabrics in her collections, symbolising the stitching together of the unusual combining of materials.

“Ceramic jewellery may work very well within the designer community for the upcoming seasons. And my plan is to produce more ceramic jewellery and push the idea of what else can be done with this material,” she stated.

Currently, Ms Zelig and Ms Cox have been working with metal, glass, plastic and leather, and brass, cotton rope and leather respectively in their ceramic jewellery. Meanwhile, Ms Jin has applied crystals in her existing collection, and she plans to expand the scope of her materials to metals and glass. More designs and categories of ceramic jewellery are expected to be accepted by jewellery companies and brands in the near future, stimulating a blossoming scene in the ceramics market.