RachelBruce | Don't live down to expectations. Go out there and do something remarkable.

Stranger Danger!

I’ve just seen that my last post was April and that it is now September… Not good on my behalf!

Apologies and I promise to be more active.

I had a long summer and it gave me a lot of time to think about my fourth year in Jewellery and Metalwork at DJCAD and also gave me a few weeks travelling round Europe with my best friend that was absolutely amazing!

Back to work now and I am looking forward to a year of degree show prep and a lot, A LOT of hard work!

Think I’m ready for it and i’ll keep this blog up to date with new thoughts and findings 🙂

I’m off to West Dean in 3 weeks to really buck up my enamel skills, cannot wait!

Thanks for bearing with me while I’ve been away. For so long.

Maybe this pic will cheer you up 🙂

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April 22, 2012

Victoria Lemon

I came across Victoria’s work on the The Guild of Enamellers, UK website and found it really interesting! Enamel is incorporated into her pies and I think she uses it in a really modern way. Something I am interested in because I find a lot of enamel work very traditional and I like to see it used in different ways. Victoria studied at Cardonald College and Glasgow School of Art. She is currently based in London, love her work!

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April 16, 2012

Yipppeee!

Delighted to find out that I have been granted a full bursary in a short enamel course at West Dean College!

The building looks amazing and I have heard so many good things about it 🙂

Looking forward to a 6 day stay there at the start of October, I will no doubt learn some very valuable skills which hopefully I can then use for my degree show! Exciting!

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April 10, 2012

Eeek!

Just realised it’s been a while since my last post!

Been very busy getting organised for my end of year assessments!

Still working away at enamelling when I can and really beginning to enjoy it. We had Jessica Howarth run a workshop a couple of weeks ago and it was great. I was really glad to learn more helpful techniques and ideas. Jessica graduated last year from DJCAD but learned a lot of her enamel skills at a short course in West Dean college, something that I am really hoping to do too. The course I want to go on isn’t till October and is five days with Jane Short. The course is a fantastic opportunity and I am really excited to go and learn from Jane. Her work is highly skilled as you can see here

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These are some of her jewellery pieces but she also works in 3D and 2D. Enamel is something I am hoping to take into fourth year and to build on my skills! Loving every second of it 🙂

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March 22, 2012

Privacy Time

There has been a lot of media hype around social networking and the impact social sites can have on employment. The fact that employers are now looking into candidates social sites to suss out personalities and lifestyles is surely to anyone, no surprise. It is pretty clever and something that is only going to happen more often as the internet advances and social networking becomes more and more popular.

We have been told before the consequences and I think as students, now is the time to make the right changes. Profiles need to be set to private, and really we should think about what exactly we are writing. I have seen some crazy statements written up by people online who clearly never think about the backlash it could have. As I personally have a Facebook, a WordPress blog and two Twitter active Twitter accounts, I feel it is now so important to think about what I write. My Facebook (set to private) for personal use and to connect with friends, however still remembering to watch what I say. You never know when Facebook’s settings may decided to change. My blog I like to keep for updating my University work and suitable for lecturers to read, and anyone else who is interested. One that I have to think about though is the two Twitter accounts. One I have under my name which I use for updates about my jewellery work but also that I use to connect with friends and family. The other is part of my business idea (EDIE&westwood) that I share with another user. Obviously the business one we want to keep open and available for everyone to see to gain business and traffic. My personal one though, I am not so sure. Nothing bad is ever said and I do watch what I say etc but wonder whether it is something I should set to ‘friends only’ just in case. It is something to think about, especially now as we are just starting out. No-one wants to shoot themselves in the foot this early, surely?

If you want some interesting stats on the topic read this,

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/facebook/6968320/Half-of-employers-reject-potential-worker-after-look-at-Facebook-page.html

It is sure to put you off writing obscenities about your horrible boss! 😉

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March 21, 2012

Who are my customers?! Anyone?!!

We have been looking into our customer base recently as part of our NESTA toolkit.

It is a tricky thing to work out, I can easily assume who my customers would be but then maybe that is just who I would like them to be. People just like me.

To be fair there are a lot of girls who are just like me. Young student, strapped for cash but still wants to shop every week.

This is where I will come in and save the day, creating fashionable items that can be afforded by my market 🙂

This is the plan.

For working out the customer base for EDIE&westwood, we made a survey monkey with some questions that we just basically wanted to know the answer to.

We pitched our business idea and asked about other shops we thought to be closely related to ours. As we had the basic survey monkey package (free) we were allowed up to 100 responses. Of course we thought ‘yep that is loads’ but we have ended up with 120 responses! Do happy to have had such good feedback and some of the answers are really useful. We sent the survery around staff and students at DJCAD and also posted to all firends on Facebook. The responses are mixed and we have a range of ages from 17-50+.

We are looking to continue our field research and are so far happy with the results. Here’s to finding our customer base!

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March 13, 2012

The Mission is …

Our workshops for the NESTA toolkit started off with me working on my own Mission Statement and ideas. Now that the project has developed and I am working as two we have been working to ocmbine our ideas and interestd so we have a balance for our company.

We are working on a high fashion unique brand, named EDIE&Westwood. Follow us on Twitter @EDIEandwestwood or on our blog http://www.edieandwestwood.wordpress.com

There isn’t a lot on there at the monment but we are hoping to start setting up as we learn and doing little bits at a time. I am currently working on some necklaces for our brand which is really exciting.

As I said we are combining our own ideas and values to create a balance in the business. Looking to make everything 50/50 we aim to share values and both believe in the business. I am guessing we will learn a lot along the way. So far we have been working on SWOT analysis, fake evidence, branding and researching our customer base.

We set up a survey last week and sent it arounf the University and around Facebook to find out thoughts about our ideas. We have had great feedback with over 90 responses 🙂

Got some really good ideas and help so looking forward to pulling the information together and working on it further.

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March 6, 2012

Two Heads Are Better Than One

Whilst working through the business sheets in the NESTA toolkit it has come to my attention that I would like to work in a partnership with a textile student to work on fashion clothing items. I have teamed up with Daisy Westwood and we are going to be business partners for this module! Looking forward to working on pulling jewellery and textile design together. Hopefully there will be some really exciting ideas coming up 🙂

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March 2, 2012

NESTA

Onto the next part of the Design and Market where we are working towards building a business proposal. We had our first workshop today where we have been working on values, mission statements, fake evidence and SWOT analysis.

The way the toolkit works is that you read through the handbooks, learn the information then put it into practice through worksheets. We worked today in groups split by disciplines so I was with the jewellers. Really fun sharing our ideas and hearing other people’s ideas. I have been thinking of my own business idea for a while but was not sure how to properly work on it or put it into words and ideas. With this kit I am able to play around with my idea and develop it. Although the thought of a 7000 word business proposal is daunting, I am excited because it is something I have wanted to do for the past year now. Looking forward to getting stuck in and finding out if there is a niche in the market for my idea!

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February 27, 2012

Presentation Reflection

Presentation is all done and dusted!

Reflecting back now I wonder about any changes we could have made. I think that we all spoke well and our point was made clear, however I feel it was almost a bit too straightforward. I think we would have liked it to be a little bit more light hearted but we felt that we presented the subject the best we could. I think we should have used different presentation software but working within a team of six meant we had to go with the preference of the majority. I am glad we all presented together and I think we worked well as a team and I know the effort was put in by everyone. Results back soon so hoping that it went well.

Next Design and Market task is the NESTA Creative Enterprise Toolkit! This part sounds exciting and I am ready to move onto a new project, it is good to mix teamwork with working on your own!

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