Berlin Wall custom paperweights

I was contacted recently by Judith who wanted some pieces of the Berlin Wall that she had collected to be encased inside three custom made paperweights.

These are all pieces of the Berlin Wall she broke off the week after the wall came down (when she was much younger and physically able).

Broken pieces of the Berlin Wall

The Berlin Wall fell on the evening of November 9th1989, when crowds of German civilians began to dismantle the graffiti covered wall. The Berlin Wall had been an East / West barrier for almost 30 years and was seen to symbolise the Cold War division of Europe.

Many people at the time collected pieces of the wall and many have been sold to tourists over the years. Judith was lucky to collect the pieces herself and decided that now is the time to have them displayed inside paperweights to give to friends and of course, keep a paperweight for herself.

She wanted three domed resin paperweights creating containing the pieces of the Berlin Wall, obviously having the coloured graffiti facing upwards on all the pieces where possible. These are the completed paperweights that I made for her:

Custom paperweights containing Berlin Wall pieces

Judith received her paperweights and this was her reaction “They have arrived and I love them. Thank you so much for getting them here in time for me to take with me. I thought the hard bit had been done, getting them made, working to the timetable, but now I must decide which one I want to keep!”

If you have pieces of the Berlin Wall (or any other sentimental items) that you would like to preserve inside bespoke paperweights, please contact me.

Mick

How to set actual paw prints into memorial jewellery

I wrote an article a while back about my paw print pet memorial jewellery. These are resin pendants and other items of memorial jewellery containing pet hair or ashes, along with a silver paw print symbol, sometimes also combined with a name, small flowers etc. An example of one of my paw print pet memorial pendants can be seen below:

Pet fur and paw print pendant

I was recently contacted by Jasmine, whose family had sadly lost their family cat Panda. The vets had kindly given them some clippings of his fur and had taken actual ink paw prints from Panda. Jasmine wondered if I could incorporate the fur clipping and paw prints into a resin memorial pendant for her daughter’s birthday.

Initially I asked Jasmine if she could send me a scanned image of the paw prints to me (which would be the best solution for incorporating the paw print into the pendant). Unable to send a scanned image, I asked Jasmine to send me a photographic image of the paw prints and a small sample of the fur. This is the photo of the paw prints that was sent to me:

Pet paw prints taken by the vets

I photo edited, resized, and then printed the paw print, and this is the completed memorial pendant. The cat fur and paw print image has been set to the front of a clear resin heart shaped pendant.

Pet fur memorial containing an actual paw print

Other prints such as nose prints and even photos of the pet can be incorporated into the memorial pendant.

Mick

Resin vs glass memorial jewellery

I have recently noticed various sellers of glass memorial jewellery quote on their websites that resin jewellery is far inferior to glass. Whether the sellers are trying to protect their brand or simply do not have any experience or understanding of working with resin jewellery, so I thought I should clear up any false claims that have been made by some of these sellers.

I have had experience of using both resin and glass in my memorial jewellery over the last 17 years in fact some of my earliest resin jewellery, made 17 years ago for my wife, still looks like new today.

Can resin jewellery break if dropped?

Resin memorial jewellery is generally durable and is fairly shatter resistant compared to glass jewellery. I would be reluctant to put sentimental items such as ashes or hair from a loved one inside glass memorial jewellery.

Broken glass memorial pendant

Alfie the parrot keepsakes

This is one of the first pet keepsakes completed this year so I though I should share it!

I was contacted recently by Zac who wanted a set of keepsake keyrings making in memory of their family parrot Alfie. This is the message that I received:

“I am looking for some items to be made for a recent pet we lost (Alfie the parrot). I've seen your Facebook page and your items look really good. 

I have a couple of grey feathers, some of his peanut shells and some of his rope swing he used to sit on. I was wondering if it would be possible to make up to three items with them things listed above.”

Later that week I received a package containing the items and prepared a design for the keyrings.

Parrot feather keepsake design

Flower petal fragments in jewellery

I am often asked whether I can work with fragments of flower petals and preserve these broken fragments within resin jewellery. I can of course work with broken pieces of flowers and petals, and have done on many occasions, resulting in beautiful pieces of jewellery.

Jewellery from real flower petal fragments

Rainbow hair keepsake locket pendant

This was the last pendant that I made last year, and I thought I should show it off and wish everyone a Happy New Year!

Rainbow hair keepsake locket pendant

Champagne or wine bottle cork paperweight

I was contacted recently by a gentleman who had a champagne cork form a special celebration (along with a silver 2025 sixpence coin). He wanted both the cork and sixpence coin setting inside a resin cube paperweight and this was his initial design:

Champagne cork paperweight design