Ostara: The Balance

A Hare at the Equinox, Hand-Pierced from an Old British Penny

For one brief moment, everything hangs in the balance.

Dark and light.

Winter and spring.

What has been and what is about to begin.

Ostara: The Balance is my little celebration of the spring equinox, handcrafted inside an original old British penny.

At its heart sits the hare.

Above it, the celestial world.

Around it, the returning landscape.

And beneath everything remains the original date of the old coin.

A moment of balance captured in a piece of copper that has already travelled through decades of changing seasons.

The Balance

Twice each year we reach an equinox.

Neither darkness nor daylight dominates.

For a fleeting moment the year appears to find its balance before continuing onwards.

At the spring equinox, that balance carries a particular promise.

Winter is loosening its grip.

The days are lengthening.

Buds are beginning to open.

Birdsong changes.

Life starts pushing back through the soil.

The year is moving towards the light.

Ostara sits on that threshold.

The Hare of Spring

The hare belongs naturally within this little equinox landscape.

Few animals are so closely associated with the arrival of spring.

As the countryside begins to wake, hares become more visible in the fields, chasing, boxing and moving with that extraordinary combination of speed and wildness.

Over generations they have gathered associations with fertility, renewal, intuition and the mysterious turning of the natural year.

But the hare in Ostara is not running.

It has stopped.

It looks upwards.

For a moment, even the wild thing is still.

As though it too has noticed the year beginning to turn.

A Moment Between Dark and Light

I have always been drawn to the edges of the day and the edges of the year.

Dawn.

Dusk.

Solstice.

Equinox.

Those moments when one thing is becoming another.

Ostara is not really about arriving.

It is about transition.

The dark has not disappeared.

Spring has not yet become summer.

Everything is simply moving again.

Balance is not standing still. It is the point from which change continues.

The Wheel of the Year

Ostara forms part of my Wheel of the Year collection, a series of pieces inspired by the changing seasons and the old human habit of noticing important moments in the natural year.

Long before calendars lived on phones and walls, people understood time by looking outside.

The height of the sun.

The length of the day.

Seeds germinating.

Fruit ripening.

Leaves falling.

The first frost.

The return of particular birds.

We may live differently now, but the old rhythm continues around us.

The Earth still turns. The light still returns.

Choose Your Penny

Ostara is made from an original large British pre-decimal penny.

Where suitable coins are available, you can choose a date from the 1890s through to 1970.

That means the year beneath the design can become part of its meaning.

A birth year.

An anniversary.

A parent’s or grandparent’s year.

A milestone birthday.

A year when life changed direction.

Or simply an old penny whose date appeals to you.

The date does not need to commemorate anything at all.

Sometimes you choose the old coin simply because you like knowing when its journey began.

The Date Was Already There

This is one of the things I love most about making jewellery from coins.

The date is genuine.

I am not engraving a significant year onto a newly made pendant.

The penny was actually struck in that year.

It existed then.

It travelled through the world from that moment onwards.

Some of these pennies have survived for well over a century before reaching my bench.

That gives a chosen date a very different feeling.

You are not simply wearing the number. You are wearing a small surviving piece of that year.

From Currency to Talisman

I do not melt the penny down.

I work inside it.

The original coin becomes the frame within which the new landscape appears.

The design is drawn onto the penny by hand.

Tiny holes are drilled into the areas that will eventually become open space.

A fine jeweller’s saw blade is threaded through each opening.

Then, slowly, the background is removed.

One tiny section at a time.

The hare emerges.

The landscape opens.

Light begins to travel through a coin that was once completely solid.

The penny is not destroyed. It changes purpose.

Made Slowly at the Hairy Growler Bench

Once the piercing is complete, the piece is refined entirely by hand.

Edges are filed and softened.

Surfaces are carved.

Fine details are engraved.

The landscape is given texture.

The hare develops its character.

The old copper is polished while retaining the marks and wear that belong to the original coin.

Because every penny is different and every piece is worked individually, no two Ostara pendants will ever be completely identical.

I like that.

The design repeats. The object never quite does.

Let the Old Penny Remain Old

A penny from the 1890s should not look as though it was made yesterday.

It may carry scratches.

Softened lettering.

Darkened areas.

Small knocks around its rim.

Evidence of thousands of unknown journeys through pockets, tills, purses and hands.

I preserve that character wherever I can.

Those marks are not imperfections in the finished jewellery.

They are part of the material.

I make the new design. Time has already done some of the decorating.

A Talisman for New Beginnings

Ostara naturally lends itself to moments of change.

A new home.

A birthday.

A new relationship.

Recovery after a difficult period.

A decision finally made.

A new direction.

Or the quiet recognition that another chapter has begun.

But its symbolism does not need to be grand.

Sometimes renewal is simply deciding to begin again tomorrow.

Every year the landscape demonstrates that beginning again is perfectly natural.

A Free Initial on the Reverse

If Ostara is being made for someone in particular, a single initial can be engraved onto the reverse of the pendant upon request at no additional charge.

It is deliberately small and personal.

The story on the front belongs to the landscape.

The little mark on the back can belong entirely to you.

Product Details

• Handcrafted Ostara: The Balance pendant
• Part of the Hairy Growler Wheel of the Year collection
• Made from an original large British pre-decimal penny
• Approximately 30mm diameter
• Choice of suitable penny dates from the 1890s through to 1970
• Ideal for significant birth years, anniversaries and milestone birthdays
• Hare and spring equinox design
• Symbolism of balance, renewal, transition and new beginnings
• Design individually drawn onto the old penny
• Traditionally hand pierced using a fine jeweller’s saw
• Hand carved and engraved detailing
• Original coin character and historic wear retained where possible
• Free engraved initial on the reverse upon request
• Optional sterling silver necklace chain
• Finesse, Flourish or Omnia silver chains recommended
• Hairy Growler handmade Shepherd’s Crook catch with silver chain options
• Individually handcrafted from recycled materials at the Hairy Growler bench in Cambridge
• Every old penny and every finished pendant will have its own subtle variations

The Old Penny and the Returning Spring

There is something rather fitting about making Ostara from old money.

The penny has already experienced spring after spring.

Some have seen seventy of them.

Some a hundred.

Some considerably more.

Empires changed.

Monarchs changed.

The penny itself eventually disappeared from circulation.

But outside, the same ancient cycle continued.

Winter.

Balance.

Spring.

Light.

And around we go again.

Ostara: The Balance

Once, it was an ordinary penny.

Now a hare waits inside it.

The old date remains.

The light passes through.

And the wheel turns once more.

Ostara: The Balance.

For that beautiful moment when the darkness and light meet as equals, just before the light begins to win.