Japan - Day 2

After the action packed first day of our trip today was where it got serious! Back to the Aida Chemicals factory for two full days of workshops, 9am – 6pm, with Ryota, one of the Art Clay masters. A chance for us all to learn new things.

Today we were learning how to bead set stones, in this case 2mm czs, into Art Clay Silver. To do this we used special beading tools which have tiny concave circular ends for creating a “bead” in the silver surface which pushes the silver over the edge of the stone to hold it in place. The result is a pave effect with the stones nearly flush on the surface. I shall be practising and using a lot more of this in the future I think. We all made two tiny pieces, drilling the holes into the unfired clay, refining them once fired and then setting the stones – this is definitely a technique you need some magnification for!

During the afternoon we laid out examples of our jewellery that several of us had brought with us and Ryota laid out examples of work done by the master instructors and then we had a wonderful session with all the masters and designers who work at the factory. For over an hour we all looked at the amazing array of work, asked each other questions about it and explained techniques on our pieces to each other. It was a fantastic exchange of information and ideas and we certainly made Dice work really hard translating everything back and forth.

 

That evening we were taken out for a Teppanyaki meal. We went to a tiny place that had a small bar at the front and at the back an area with low tables each with an iron griddle set into it. We all sat around the tables and all the food was cooked for us by Dice, Ryota and others from Aida. It was a fun evening and the chance to experience something we would not have done on our own.