Imogen Belfield is a jewelry designer from London. She graduated from the Sir John Cass School of Art, Media & Design at The London Metropolitan University and has won a ton of awards and everyone loves her. Including me. Her work consists of a number of cast pieces as well as a technique of embedding porcelain in metal which gives it a very prehistoric fossil-like quality. Actually, some of her pieces quite remind me of religious relics (I've been seeing a lot lately).

The Cave Ring from her FW09 collection. Quoth Imogen: "The goblin-like arms of the metal protectively clasp the porcelain form in their grip, allowing the smooth sensation of the ceramic to rest over the finger." Available at Not Just A Label for $779.

Bark Ring from her SS09 collection "Architectural hors d’oeuvres." To quote Imogen again, "the sweeping cuts across the gold add a dramatic sense of movement and speed, inspired by the constant change, chaos and vibrancy of London’s city street cultures." Not sure I totally buy it, but whatevs. (Also at NJAL)

It's almost inappropriate how much the fact that the ring on the left isn't a complete circle pleases me.

Obviously I love these. They look like old bones.

china white

The JC Report says that porcelain jewelry is in. Given what I've seen of porcelain jewelry in the past, this was unexciting news, but since what I do love most is someone reinterpreting a material and using it in a completely new way, there has to be some hope for legitimately cool porcelain baubles. The only example that I have encountered as of yet is a project called Urban Cast Away that Dror Benshetrit did for the Construkt/Marithe+Francoise Girbaud shop three years ago. Fairly recently some of the pieces were still available for purchase, but no longer. Weak. Not that I could have managed to wear one without shattering it, but still.

If I remember correctly, the forms are made by dipping pieces of vintage fur into porcelain and then firing them. I love the shapes they create, like those high-speed photos of a drop of milk splashing into a puddle. They also remind me of the fragile curves of ruffled nudibranchs.

In any event, I love the organic forms created in the process, and I love that if cracked open they'd reveal tufts of aging fox fur. There's something mildly creepy about them, as they do resemble, in the broadest sense, human teeth. I have no problem with wearing human teeth, as the prospect of having my wisdom teeth pulled was made brighter by the thought of what I could turn the uprooted teeth into. I feel like they would make good cufflinks, but I'm just going to drill a hole through one and string it on a chain. I actually wore a plastic dentures charm to a denim-on-denim/accessories party on Friday, allegedly from the 70s, that I bought at a vintage store in high school. And, even more coincidentally, today as I was reading The Swindler for one of my classes, I noticed that one of the characters is in possession of a rosary made of dead men's teeth. Although hers is for witch-purposes rather than a sartorial choice. Needless to say I am intrigued by the idea.

This last piece reminds me of a bird or animal skull, which I rather like. Eventually I'll do a post on Skulls That Don't Suck, but I have yet to come upon sufficient fodder for it.