Six years ago I started my own jewellery range after struggling to find earrings that wouldn’t irritate my allergic skin. Porcelain and gold were the perfect solution as they are exceptionally light weight - each earring weighs only 1g! So light weight that you don’t even realise you are wearing earrings.
Porcelain jewellery has its own delicate translucency while being extremely strong. White porcelain has an elegant simplicity that lends itself to fine details and strong lines which I focus on refining in each piece. When I design a piece I look at the overall balance and movement of the earring - how it will catch the light and how the shape of the bead will influence the decoration I apply. I have chosen a colour palette that reflects the Irish countryside and coastal waters .… mossy green and blue with a tinge of green and also the pure white of the porcelain.
Each piece is hand shaped before being fired 3 times in a kiln up to temperatures as high as 1250C. The final firing is to fuse the 22K gold to the glaze which has been hand painted onto the bead.
My new 2023 Summer Collection has been inspired by the pink and white cherry blossoms and light blue spring sky - I have stained the porcelain with these colours instead of painting over the porcelain with glaze - thereby maintaining the transparent qualities of the porcelain and creating an etherial beauty in the earrings. I continue to explore and develop my range of porcelain jewellery being inspired by the beauty of the wild coastline and countryside. I love to work with porcelain, it is not always an easy medium, but the passion I feel when you open the kiln and those delicate beads reveal themselves is magical.
I lovingly hand craft and design all jewellery pieces in County Carlow, Ireland.
Natalie Alers