The Guild of Enamellers

Young Enamellers Award

It is part of the Guild’s aims to promote enamelling to young people, and to that end, Tilly Wilkinson, Regional Representative of Region 3, recently proposed a ‘Young Enamellers Award’ for consideration by the Executive Committee at their October meeting.

The objective of the Young Enamellers Award is to encourage children, who are members of the Guild through family or school and corporate membership, to create and submit work to the Guild Exhibition at Conference each year with the chance of winning recognition of their efforts in the form of a certificate of Achievement and a years free membership as their prize.

Rachel Gogerly recently had the opportunity to extend her knowledge and skills enamelling Palladium, a ‘new’ metal to the jewellery industry, which as yet has little technical information recorded on how well or not it enamels.

This opportunity came about with the introduction of Palladium hallmarking in the UK this year and to commemorate this, the Wardens of Birmingham Assay Office commissioned a new Badge of Office for their Assay Master Michael Allchin. Designed and made by Silversmith and Palladium expert, Martyn Pugh, it was the first Palladium piece to be marked in Birmingham.
The design included various symbols, including the depiction of the atomic structure of Palladium and at its centre, the Anchor, which has been the town mark of the Birmingham Assay Office since it was founded in 1773. Flames on one section of the badge (representing cupellation, the traditional method of fire assaying) required enamelling and it was this section that Rachel was invited to create vibrant transparent colours of red, orange and yellow.

Starting with no experience of working with enamel on Palladium and not knowing if it could be enamelled or to what quality, a number of samples and some experimentation were required to establish how best to proceed. There were four main questions Rachel wanted answered, ‘Can Palladium be enamelled? And if so, what preparation is required? Can consistent good quality results be achieved? Finally, how does Palladium influence the appearance of transparent enamel?’

How to sgrafitto enamel on nickel: I used a copper nickel alloy and liquid flux to enable designs to be drawn into the enamel. The aim was to have dark lines where the oxide formed, to enhance the print-look of the piece. I used watered down wet process flux, and allowed the excess flux to drip off the metal before drying. Below are the stages I used to make my small panels. The enamel can be temperamental- so experiment!

1.Clean the nickel with wire wool – not too shiny as the enamel will not stay on.
2.Brush on a very thin layer of wet process flux and allow it to dry.
3.Scratch the design into the dried enamel.
4.Fire in a hot kiln - 800° or bright orange.
5.Do not put in pickle as the scratched out lines will become pink.