Celia Hart's blog about what's going on in and around her studio.
Art, printmaking, inspirations, gardening, vegetables, hens, landscapes, wild flowers, East Anglia, adventure, travel.

Friday 18 April 2008

The carnelian project - Part 1


In 2004, while on holiday on the Pacific Coast of Washington State USA, we went for a walk on Agate Beach in Westport and Cliff picked up this nodule of what we assumed might be agate.

When we got home we put it on the bedroom window sill and occasionally picked it up and wondered if it was worth getting sliced and polished. Would it have concentric bands of colour and crystals in the centre?

Just before Christmas 2007 we were in Bury St Edmunds and noticed a new Rock and Gem shop, I went in and asked the helpful man behind the counter if he new anyone who would cut and polish our rock – he gave us a leaflet about Rock and Gem Fairs, and advised us to check out the list of exhibitors. This led us to Derek, and in January this year we posted our 'agate' to him. He promptly emailed me "it's not an agate" . . . we were disappointed . . . "but it is a very fine carnelian" . . . that sounds exciting!

A few days ago I received a small padded packet in the post, it contained these . . .


. . . they are even more beautiful when back-lit on my light box . . .

. . . and earlier today I took the carnelians to Abi of Silver Spirals who is going to work on Part 2 of our carnelian project . . . I'm really excited about what she's going to make for me!
Posted by Celia Hart on Friday, April 18, 2008

9 comments:

  1. Amy18 April 2008 at 23:05

    What a great find! I've always wanted to get into collecting rocks. It's so great that you were able to take your carnelain and have it made into something very beautiful.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Rebsie Fairholm18 April 2008 at 23:30

    I love carnelian! Those are really beautiful.

    ReplyDelete
  3. dinahmow19 April 2008 at 06:40

    Lovely! The question is: will the square pieces become cuff links for C. or ear rings for C?

    ReplyDelete
  4. Anonymous19 April 2008 at 11:40

    Such excitement! How wonderful to finally discover what you have and to see how beautiful it is. Carnelian is one of my birthstones...;-)

    ReplyDelete
  5. Gina19 April 2008 at 18:50

    How beautiful. I can't wait to see what you are having made.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Anonymous20 April 2008 at 17:16

    what a treasure. I love the serendipity of that.

    Diane

    ReplyDelete
  7. Cottage Smallholder21 April 2008 at 09:31

    Carnelians are such beautiful stones. How lovely to pick one up in a different land and make something eqxisite in the UK.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Threadspider22 April 2008 at 13:47

    Perhaps the carnelian found you? I echo Diane's sentiment-what serendipity.

    ReplyDelete
  9. Teresa25 April 2008 at 04:02

    Oh my goodness! To think hidden treasures such as this are on the coast of my own state!

    ReplyDelete

I love reading all the comments (except for spam and advertising which I will delete) and I'll reply here in the comments under each blog post, it may take a few days if I'm busy.
You don't need to have a blog to leave a comment, you can select the name/URL option and fill in just your name instead of a blog link.

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)