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Alice Rochester
7th April 2010 14:58

Napoleonic bee inspired pendant

 

This gorgeous pendant has a lovely story behind it so I thought I'd share it with you.

John said in his first email to us:

'There were a number of odd coincidences in our backgrounds and things of that nature that occurred over the years and we have often commented that there must have been something in our destiny that brought us together. That word stuck in my mind and reminded me of the story about the wedding gift presented to Josephine by Napoleon Bonaparte - that is reputed to have been an enameled medallion, engraved (in French) with the words 'to destiny' this was hanging from a hair 'chain' ( I have never managed to find any record or photo of it anywhere though.) There is another comment made by the same man, when talking about Josephine that goes something along the lines of 'she is all woman, whenever she meets anyone the will never leave them indifferent' - sums her up well, always capable, always there sorting things out, will do anything for anyone and will always speak her mind - well, she is a Yorkshire lass!'

I did a bit of research before the appointment and found a number of really interesting things which I wanted to talk to John about. The first was that although we couldn’t find any pictorial record of the original pendant, I did find a reference to the bee design that was Napoleon’s symbol on a Napoleon enthusiast's blog . The bee the blog refers to was apparently from Napoleon's coronation robes, and the first thing I thought when I saw it was what a lovely pendant it would make. It's simple outline was almost orchid-like in appearance, and John had also mentioned that Ruth was a bit of a nature lover. I also thought that the bee was symbolic in its own right as bees are reputed to be hard working and organized and of course the queen bee rules the hive.

Obviously a hair chain is not the most durable or practical of things to wear, so I looked at alternatives, and thought that a delicate, twisted silver chain would work really nicely instead.

When I spoke to John about all of this in our appointment he agreed with everything I had suggested, and was delighted with the shape of the pendant because Ruth's favourite flower is an orchid! I drew him a little sketch to illustrate what I had in mind and we decided to get started straight away, making it in silver as we knew this was what Ruth particularly likes.

Sketch

The final pendant is 25mm in length and has simple detailing hand engraved into the flat surface of the metal, giving the bee stripes and his body shape without making it too overtly bee-like. The front legs hide the bail where the chain connects to the bee, keeping the lines as simple as possible and giving the pendant a contemporary feel. The pendant has a bright polished finish and is easy to wear everyday while being an interesting talking point with a lovely story behind it. We had a lot of girls in the studio asking if they could have one too - it was admired very much by everyone.

Bespoke Sterling Silver Bee Pendant
Alice Rochester
 

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  • Harriet Kelsall Jewellery Design, North Barn, Fairclough Hall Farm, Halls Green, Weston, Hertfordshire, SG4 7DP, England
    Phone: +44 (0)1462 790565 Fax: +44 (0)1462 790140 enquiries@hkjewellery.co.uk
  • Harriet Kelsall Jewellery Design, 6/7 Green Street, Cambridge, Cambridgeshire, CB2 3JU, England.
    Phone: +44 (0)1223 461333 Fax: +44 (0)1223 365269 cambridge@hkjewellery.co.uk

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