INTERVIEW
We love your beautiful creations but tell us a bit about the lady behind them . I ’ m Claire and I live in Staffordshire with my lovely husband Tony and my fantastic ( and very demanding ) cats , aka “ Fur kids ”. I ' m lucky enough to be a full time glass artist and jewellery designer . I ' m currently living in a built up area at the moment but I am country girl at heart , being brought up in Kent , then onto live in Wales before I came to Staffordshire . I love getting out and about in the UK and ‘ experiencing ’ and connecting to the landscape . It may be hard doing this living in an urban setting , but we are at least very lucky to live only a short trip from the Peak District , Cheshire and North Wales , so we try to get ‘ out there ’ as much as we practically can . I ' m also a Pagan and environmentalist and this is central to my creativity as well as my everyday life . My spirituality , pantheist beliefs , and love of nature and the earth play a big part in my inspiration .
Have you always been creative or did your talent evolve over time ? I ' ve always been involved with arts and crafts , and as a child I was always drawing pictures or doing something creative . This carried on through my whole education and after school I went on to study Fine Arts along with English at university . I became a full time jewellery designer 10 years ago , including designing jewellery for a high street store for a while . I got into making glass beads in 2006 so I could use them in my handmade jewellery , however the love for making them overtook my life so I just focused on glass and that is when Rowanberry Glass Art was born . In the past 2 years my love for making jewellery has been rekindled , this time using etched copper and metal clays , so I changed my name to Rowanberry Designs to reflect this new direction . My style has always been pretty much the same whatever medium I have worked with , mixing a love for nature with a love for figurative detail . My biggest change in my creativity was the change from making glass beads purely for people to make jewellery with towards making a bead as a collectable piece of art as itself . Now I approach each bead as if it was a wearable painting or sculpture .
What is it that you enjoy most about your work ? I love being my own boss . I ’ ve suffered with some health problems for well over 18 years now , which has meant that “ regular ” employment is not an option for me and working at your own pace is important to me as regular resting is a must . As for glass there ' s always something new to learn and always something new and exciting to try out . Glass is a mesmerising medium to work and always presents a challenge to you in one way or another . Using it is an ever evolving skill and I find that exhilarating . www . creative-crafting . com 7