A little more detail…

Stonehenge Kuff

A Wearable Stonehenge Handcrafted from Old Silver Coins and an Antique Silver Fork

Some pieces begin as jewellery.

This one began as a place.

The Stonehenge Kuff is one of my signature Hairy Growler pieces, a miniature Stonehenge built from old silver and curved around the wrist.

The stones are individually formed from recycled silver coins.

The ground beneath them was once an antique silver fork.

At either end sit the two great celestial markers that have watched over Stonehenge for thousands of years.

The sun and the moon.

It is jewellery when worn.

When you take it off, something else happens.

Stand the Kuff on a surface, turn it towards the light, and the little monument becomes a landscape of its own.

You can watch the sun rise between the stones.

A Hairy Growler Signature Piece

The Stonehenge Kuff sits at the heart of what Hairy Growler has become.

Old silver.

British landscape.

Ancient history.

Folklore.

Traditional hand skills.

And objects that reveal more the longer you live with them.

This is not simply a picture of Stonehenge placed onto a bracelet.

It is Stonehenge built in miniature.

Individual uprights rise from a curved silver foundation.

Lintels cross between them.

The stones differ in height, width, angle and surface.

Open sky remains between them.

The whole structure follows the curve of the wrist.

It is part cuff, part sculpture and part tiny ancient landscape.

The Stones

I did not want the stones to look like neat pieces of polished jewellery.

Stonehenge is not neat.

Its surviving stones lean.

They weather.

They fracture.

Their surfaces carry thousands of years of exposure to wind, rain, frost and sunlight.

So each miniature stone is individually formed from old silver coin and given its own irregular character.

The surfaces are worked by hand to create a weathered, almost geological texture.

Some stand straight.

Some lean slightly.

Some are broader and heavier.

Others create narrow openings through which the light can travel.

No two stones are quite the same, because no two stones should be.

Built Upon an Antique Silver Fork

The foundation of the Kuff began life as an old silver fork.

I love that.

An object made for an entirely ordinary purpose has become the ground beneath one of the most extraordinary structures in the British landscape.

The fork is cut, forged, curved and transformed until its previous function almost disappears.

Almost.

I do not believe recycled materials need to have every trace of their former lives erased.

The transformation is part of the story.

Old cutlery becomes landscape. Old coins become stone.

Sun at One End. Moon at the Other.

The Stonehenge Kuff does not end with the stones.

At either side of the monument sit the sun and moon.

They turn the cuff into something larger than a miniature archaeological structure.

They place the stones back beneath the sky.

Stonehenge has an extraordinary relationship with the movement of the sun, most famously through its alignment with the solstices.

Thousands of years after the monument was constructed, people still gather there to watch the sun rise and set.

The people change.

The ritual changes.

The sun keeps returning.

The Sun Between the Stones

This is my favourite part of the piece.

When the Kuff is being worn, the sun and moon sit at the ends of the silver landscape.

But take the cuff from your wrist and place it upright.

Move around it.

Change your viewpoint.

Suddenly the spaces between the stones begin to matter.

The little sun can be seen through them.

Position the piece carefully and you can create your own miniature Stonehenge sunrise.

The jewellery becomes a tiny monument.

That second life is deliberate.

I like jewellery that rewards another look.

A piece should not necessarily reveal everything in the first few seconds.

The Stonehenge Kuff has one character on the wrist and another when it is placed in front of you.

Jewellery That Becomes an Object

Most jewellery disappears into a box when it is not being worn.

The Stonehenge Kuff does not have to.

It can stand.

It can cast shadows.

Light can travel through the stones.

The sun can appear between the uprights.

The monument changes as you move around it.

That makes it something unusual within the Hairy Growler collection.

It is wearable jewellery that becomes a small sculptural object when it leaves the body.

Stonehenge and the Turning Year

Stonehenge was constructed and altered over many generations.

Its precise meanings to the people who built and used it are lost to us, but its relationship with the movement of the sun remains written into the monument itself.

The solstices mark the extremes of the solar year.

Light reaching its height.

Darkness reaching its depth.

And then the slow turning back again.

That cycle gives the Stonehenge Kuff another layer of meaning.

It can represent time.

Endurance.

Return.

The turning seasons.

Or simply the strange comfort of knowing that people stood beneath the same sun thousands of years before us.

Old Silver Remembering Ancient Stone

The materials are deliberately old.

The stones begin as silver coins.

The base begins as an antique silver fork.

These objects already had lives before they reached my bench.

Coins were carried in pockets and purses.

The fork once sat at somebody’s table.

They belonged to ordinary human lives.

Now they have been brought together to recreate a monument built by people whose own everyday objects disappeared thousands of years ago.

There is something I find deeply satisfying about that.

History made from history.

Built, Not Manufactured

The Stonehenge Kuff cannot simply be stamped out of a sheet of metal.

It has to be built.

Old coins are selected and cut apart.

Individual stones are shaped.

Their surfaces are textured by hand.

The antique fork is transformed into the curved foundation.

The sun and moon are made and positioned.

The entire miniature structure is assembled, refined and balanced so that it works both as a piece of jewellery and as a small standing sculpture.

There are easier ways to make a cuff.

This was never intended to be one of them.

Made Slowly at the Hairy Growler Bench

Pieces like this are why I still believe the hand of the maker matters.

A machine could make every stone identical.

I do not want them identical.

A computer could make every gap mathematically perfect.

Stonehenge was never about mathematical visual perfection.

The tiny variations are what allow the piece to feel like something built rather than something printed.

Tool marks remain.

Hammered surfaces remain.

Old silver carries scars from its previous life.

And my own decisions remain in every stone.

You can see how it was made because somebody actually made it.

A Piece That Changes With the Light

On the wrist, the open structure allows skin, clothing and daylight to appear between the stones.

As your hand moves, the monument changes.

Highlights travel across the textured silver.

Darkness gathers between the uprights.

The sun and moon appear and disappear depending on the angle.

Placed on a table or shelf, the same openings begin to frame whatever lies beyond them.

Morning light gives one view.

Evening light gives another.

The empty spaces are as much a part of the design as the silver itself.

A Future Archaeology

I often think about what happens to handmade objects after the person who made them has gone.

Stonehenge itself is the ultimate version of that question.

We know there were makers.

We can see what they built.

But their voices are gone.

The object remains.

That idea sits quietly behind this piece.

I make jewellery from materials that have already outlived their original purpose.

Then I make something I hope might be kept again.

Worn.

Marked.

Passed on.

Perhaps one day somebody will hold it without knowing very much about the hands that made it.

But the hammer marks will still be there.

The object will remember.

Product Details

• Signature Hairy Growler Stonehenge Kuff
• Handcrafted sculptural silver cuff
• Stonehenge inspired three-dimensional construction
• Individual standing stones handcrafted from recycled silver coins
• Base handcrafted from an antique silver fork
• Sun and moon positioned at opposite ends of the Kuff
• Individually textured stone surfaces
• Open construction allows light to pass between the stones
• Designed to be worn around the wrist
• Can also be positioned as a freestanding miniature Stonehenge
• Can be arranged so the sun appears to rise between the stones
• Traditional silversmithing, forming, forging, texturing and hand-finishing techniques
• Historic marks and character of the recycled silver retained where appropriate
• Individually handcrafted at the Hairy Growler bench
• Each Kuff will have subtle variations because of the original materials and handmade construction

A Hairy Growler Canon Piece

Some designs belong to a collection.

Others become part of the language of the maker.

The Stonehenge Kuff is one of those pieces.

It brings together the things that have come to define Hairy Growler.

Recycled old silver.

Traditional hand skills.

The British landscape.

Ancient places.

Time.

Folklore.

And the belief that materials with a past can still have a future.

It is not trying to make Stonehenge new.

It is trying to carry something of Stonehenge forward.

From Currency to Monument

Once, the silver was money.

Once, the fork belonged at a table.

Now they stand together as stones beneath a silver sky.

Wear it and Stonehenge curves around your wrist.

Take it off and stand it before the light.

Find the right angle.

Look through the stones.

And there it is.

The sun rising again.