Emily’s Sourcebook Vol. I

Emily’s Sourcebook Vol. I

From the studio of Emily Nixon – the first in a series tracing her evolving practice and the stories that kindle her work. An ongoing reflection on a life shaped by material, landscape and time.

“So many people select a stone or pebble to carry for the day. The weight and form and texture felt in our hands relates us to the past and gives us a sense of universal force… a symbol of continuity, a silent image of our desire for survival, peace, and security.” — Barbara Hepworth

A Pocket Full of Stones

She can’t recall when the habit began – only that it’s never left her. At the bench, fragments of the coast are always near. Smoothed stone, seaweed twist, objects that haven’t moved in twenty years. In the studio, these stones become more than inspiration – they become tools – her old faithfuls. She presses their textures into wax, letting their fluid forms guide her hand, as if drawing three-dimensionally. These imprints might seem hammered but they’re made purely through touch. Without meaning to, Emily has shaped much of her life around the stone’s irregular forms and quiet presence. Yet she doesn’t take direct inspiration from the sea or land – not in a literal sense. The coast might be a beginning but it’s never the whole idea. That would be too easy. Her work is shaped not only by place but by years of a singular experience – as an artist, a curator, a thinker who draws with sculpture – blurring the line between form and function. Her world ebbs and flows, evolving new ideas and stories she wants to capture.

Emily always has a stone in her pocket.

Emily never set out to be a jeweller and still sees herself as something of an outsider in that world. When making her first chain, her hands moved instinctively. Not towards clean geometry but towards forms that felt worn, uneven and elemental. Like the stones she collects, no two links are ever the same. Rolling, twisting, stretching wax like crocheting yarn. One part of the mind engaged in motion, the other free to wander. That’s when the real ideas come.


Even so, that tension between the precious and the raw is where she thrives. Jewellery that holds stories, that shows its marks. Spontaneity and roughness – bringing it to life. And yet, she works in gold and with precious stones, shaping the earth’s most treasured materials with raw instinct. That contradiction captivates her and is the fine line her clients are drawn to. 


This way of working doesn’t follow schedules. Creativity, for Emily, arrives unannounced. She might begin a ring and end up with earrings instead. It’s never about the outcome, it’s all about the making.

She swims and walks the coast when she can. Those rhythms of walking, collecting, noticing shaped the early days – and she’s learning to let them guide her work again. The coast is always present, even when unspoken; it lingers in form and feeling. Seaweed, kelp, dulse – their frilled edges, tangled holdfasts and the way they dry into sculptural twists. Not conventionally beautiful but rich in character. She likens them to Elizabethan ruffles, worn around the neck. 

Emily needs the presence of these things. Shells, textures, scraps of the natural world. Not as direct reference but as energy. Companions in the process. A conversation between earth and artistry – one that began with a stone in her pocket. 

 

 

Words by Rebecca de Havas

 

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