November 21st - February 28th 2010
Join with us in celebrating our tenth birthday at venues across Birmingham and beyond this winter.
Exciting Exhibition Opportunity at Birmingham’s newly re-opened mac
Call for designer makers
Brilliantly Birmingham – International Contemporary Jewellery Festival will this year be starting a new decade of activity, in the newly built gallery space at mac. Since 1999, Brilliantly Birmingham has grown from an informal group of local designer makers who gathered together to market themselves under a single brand to an international contemporary jewellery festival attracting designer makers from across the globe. Birmingham and the West Midlands region are rich in contemporary jewellery talent and Birmingham’s historic yet thriving Jewellery Quarter is unique in the world. Brilliantly Birmingham’s aim is to celebrate and promote this distinctive character of the city, and the region, under a brand that stands for innovation, quality and style.
FLUX, A BRILLIANTLY BIRMINGHAM exhibition, now in its fifth year, will create exposure for the best of contemporary jewellery design through a highly visible and high profile public selling event at mac, located in Birmingham’s Cannon Hill Park. From 27 Nov – 9 Jan, A dynamic and ambitious exhibition of new and emerging designer makers will promote challenging and diverse new work, create a marketplace and contribute to the city as a visitor attraction.
FLUX is open to new and emerging designer makers, having no longer than five years graduated from their specialist area of study and based in the UK. Participation in FLUX is by open submission and a selection panel process.
BRILLIANTLY BIRMINGHAM will not charge designer makers an exhibition fee, public entry fee or commission on sold work. Each application needs to be submitted with a £20.00 administration charge. Payment can be made by cheque, payable to Birmingham City Council.
If you are a professional designer maker based in the UK download a FLUX application pack here! FlUX Application Pack 2010
For general enquiries please telephone or email Julie Sutton 0121 303 2434 Julie.A.Sutton@birmingham.gov.uk
Submission deadline Friday 3rd September 2010.
The Brilliantly Birmingham blog will shortly be shutting up its proverbial shop for another year, but before we go, we’ve got a couple of VERY important announcements.
Read more …
It’s the fourth and final Brilliantly Birmingham Walk in the Quarter tomorrow (Saturday) in what has been a hugely successful series from our resident historian Chris Upton.
Tomorrow’s final walk kicks off, as ever, at 2pm, and it gets back to the basics of what the Jewellery Quarter is all about. Jewellery, of course!
The walk will be all about how jewellery making is still thriving in the quarter more than two hundred years after it all began.
Chris will be calling in to a traditional studio – which has changed little since jewellery was first made there in the eighteenth century.
Now it’s all booked up but in the event of any cancellations, the walk kicks off at the Museum of the Jewellery Quarter on Vyse Street.
If you’ve been to a Walk this year, we’d love to hear from you about what you thought of them, so get in touch with us using the comments page below!
We’ve flagged this Saturday’s first Brilliantly Birmingham talk up a couple of times, but they say it takes three mentions of something for it to truly sink in, so here’s your last chance to jump on board.
The talk starts at 2pm on Saturday at Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery and is called “Form To Function”, a session all about giving new and emerging designer makers the confidence to make creative decisions and identify business options in the early stages of their career.
And with times as hard as they are for all of us right now, we could all do with a helping hand, right?
The panel again is made up of established designer makers who’ve set up successful businesses, from local boy James Newman to designers du jour Tatty Devine. 2010 looks set to be another challenging year economically, so the chance to grab a few nuggets of expertise from these guys will go a long way.
There are a few limited spaces left on this weekend’s talk, and another one entitled Brilliantly Birmingham 1809 which I’ll tell you more about this week. To book on either of them, email is on prim.currie@birmingham.gov.uk or call us on 0121 464 1187.
Christmas may be taking over everyone’s thoughts at the moment (and how to keep warm in this horrendously cold weather!) but if you’re an emerging designer maker trying to make your way in the jewellery industry, here’s the first important date of 2010 for your diaries.
Form to Function, Saturday 9th January, 2pm, Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery
It’s the first of this year’s Brilliantly Birmingham talks, with esteemed guests including jewellery designers du jour Tatty Devine, Birmingham’s very own James Newman, highly respected ceramic artist Nicola Malkin and Dorothy Hogg MBE, V&A’s jeweller in residence and former Head of Jewellery and Silversmithing at Edinburgh College of Art.
It’s all about turning your artistry in to a lasting career, identifying business opportunities, and making the most of your talent, from people who’ve done just that.
Booking is essential, so please give us a call on 0121 464 1187 to reserve your space – places are limited.
All it leaves for me is to wish you a very Merry Christmas and happy new year, and we hope Brilliantly Birmingham’s tenth anniversary has satisfied your appetites for contemporary jewellery!
You’ve got one last chance to check out a fantastic, and unprecedented, collaboration between designer makers from Birmingham and those from Barcelona in Spain. It closes at the School of Jewellery on Friday 18th.
Read more …
This weekend will probably be the busiest couple of shopping days of the year, as rampant shoppers clamour to the likes of the Bullring to grab their last few presents.
Just, for a second, imagine those thousands of people; queuing not just to be served, but for the escalators, the lift, the car park, for lunch. Do you really want to put yourself through all that? Do you?!
Well, here at Brilliantly Birmingham things are a bit more relaxed, but none the less exciting. This is our Big Weekend. Not only are most of our exhibitions up and running now (see the event guide), it’s also our Open Studios day on Saturday AND another of Chris Upton’s Walks in the Quarter. So you could pick up a bespoke (and affordable) piece of jewellery for a loved one, and learn something at the same time.
Read more …
We’re all about pushing the boundaries at Brilliantly Birmingham, and bringing contemporary jewellery to people and places that wouldn’t normally have access to it….
Hence our idea for a Pop Up Shop!
Read more …
Much of what makes Brilliantly Birmingham so great is the way it nurtures emerging and young talent and gives them a showcase for their work.
Occasionally, though, it’s also important to recognise Birmingham’s unrivalled jewellery making heritage that’s kept the city at the centre of the UK jewellery trade for centuries.
The Assay Office is at the epicentre of that heritage, and this Thursday there’s a unique opportunity to visit the office on Newhall Street to view its Private Silver Collection.
These visits are usually reserved for organised groups, so you won’t get a chance like this again. As well as the silver collection, you’ll also be able to view the Library, and hear from the curator Dr Sally Baggott about the history of hallmarking and the Assay Office itself.
If you’re free this Thursday, either at 10.30am or 2pm, book yourself on a visit today. It’ll cost just £7, which I think’s a bit of a bargain.
To book a place, call 0871 871 6020 or email silver@theassayoffice.co.uk
A quick reminder that the first Walk in the Quarter, hosted by historian Chris Upton is on Saturday November 28th.
It’s called “Peardrops, Real Ale and Mints”, and in Upton’s own words, “Warstone Lane has changed little since the Ice Age. Today we’ll explore just a few thousand years of its history”.
You’ll just have to sign up to find out where the peardrops, real ale and mints come in!
It starts at 2pm, meeting at the Clock slap bang in the centre of the Jewellery Quarter. If it’s too late to call us on 0121 464 1187, Chris always welcomes late comers on the day. Enjoy!
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