The Goldsmiths' Company

We're thrilled to share that Annie Warburton FCGI, Chief Executive and Clerk of The Goldsmiths' Company has been awarded Fellowship of the City & Guilds of London Institute – the highest honour that the Council can confer on an individual – in recognition of her personal contribution to, and support of, technical education and training, her commitment to skills development and her career-long commitment to equity and diversity. Annie, who is the first female clerk in the Goldsmiths’ Company’s 697-year history, received her diploma from HRH The Princess Royal in a ceremony at the 2024 Princess Royal Training Awards, held on 21 November, at Goldsmiths’ Hall. The annual awards celebrate companies and organisations who prove exceptional commitment to learning and development. Winners come from all sectors of the economy and society spanning from large public firms to SMEs and charities from across the UK and Ireland. This year award winners included the National Theatre, Bentley Motors, Changing Lives (Newcastle), Dishoom and IBM. The Goldsmiths' Centre was recognised by an award in 2017. https://lnkd.in/em8XA3xP

“The literacy challenges in the twenty communities where the National Literacy Trust works across the UK are all very different and it’s only through frontline teams who understand, know and can lead action in those communities, who can bring together the community and voluntary sector as well as the business community and schools that we can make a real difference by working together.” Jonathan Douglas, Chief Executive.  We believe that by taking coordinated action at a local level to drive up literacy levels, we can support increased educational attainment and employability skills and improve health outcomes and social and cultural capital. That’s why, yesterday, at Bradford City Hall, we brought together businesses, funders and local organisations to share the work we are doing to build life-long literacy skills in the city and help create a legacy for Bradford as the UK’s City of Culture 2025.  In Bradford, 22% of children are living below the poverty line, and both the writing and reading skills of Key Stage 1 children are significantly below the national average. In 2023, 44% of pupils in Bradford did not reach the expected standard in writing. This number increases significantly amongst disadvantaged pupils, with 57% of pupils on Free Schools Meals not achieving the expected standard in writing. In the same year, 37% of pupils in Bradford did not reach the expected standard in reading, a number that rises to 49% amongst pupils on Free Schools Meals.  To address these problems, frontline teams in Bradford have been working with over 30,000 children, families and teachers since 2014, including putting over 100,000 books into the hands of children, many of whom did not own a single book, and yesterday we launched an innovative and evidence-based three-year programme that aims to improve the literacy skills of 1000 children from disadvantaged communities across 22 primary schools in Bradford. Children participating in the 500 Writers programme, generously supported by The Goldsmiths' Company, will enjoy expertly curated, inspirational visits to museums and art galleries and teachers will receive cutting-edge training and tools that will harness the power of these memorable cultural experiences in improving reading and writing skills.  To find out more about the National Literacy Trust’s work in communities across the UK visit: https://lnkd.in/eKqFKcWG

“I like leaving people with questions rather than answers simply because I think that's what I enjoy in other people's work as well. I like not understanding something.” For Goldsmiths’ Stories, jeweller Ella Fearon-Low spoke with artist-jeweller Zoe Arnold for the first instalment of her three part series on inspirational women using the intersection between jewellery and art as a way to access female creative identity. "When I chose to retrain as a jeweller I explored studying sculpture. Having spent my childhood engrossed in projects making miniature things, jewellery won out. From the outset I have been interested in the links between jewellery and art and have always viewed it as small-scale wearable sculpture. I was in awe of Maisie Broadhead’s work when I first saw it, pearls tumbling out of a contemporary old mistress portrait. I have spent many hours sketching and marvelling in the V&A’s jewellery galleries, at art and artist jewellery past and present, from Calder and Ramshaw to Speckner and Shoshtary. For International Women’s Day 2021 I spoke with three jewellers I admire. Each chosen for their practices and the way that they merge jewellery with fine art in different ways. In the UK we seem more reticent to embrace this space between art and jewellery – we are not brought up with the language of it in the way that continental Europeans are. I would love to see more appreciation of this work in the UK and more opportunities to exhibit and talk about it. Artist-jeweller Zoe Arnold is perfect to begin this conversation. When I think of Zoe’s work, I see a refined balance of materials, a strong narrative element - sometimes closely linked to her own writing, and a unique decorative signature. It is beguiling, so materially subtle, personal and recognisable that surely everyone would like to own a piece." Continue reading Zoe's Goldsmiths' Story – https://lnkd.in/eHtP7HMn #GoldsmithsStories

For #ThrowbackThursday we've been digging through the recent Archives, and come up with this topical article from the 2012-13 edition of the Goldsmiths' Company Review – "Dominic Reid: Pageantmaster", written by former Librarian David Beasley. He details the role of the Pageantmaster in the annual Lord Mayor's Show which has been held by Dominic Reid OBE since 1992. The Pageantmaster is responsible for delivering the Lord Mayor to the Royal Courts of Justice in the Strand to swear allegiance to the Sovereign. Dominic succeeded the role from his father in 1992, continuing as the Show has increased in size, participation and presentation. The Lord Mayor’s Show is the largest unrehearsed procession in the world, and it's down to Dominic to organise the timetable for the Show which is calculated to the second. When you see the Pageantmaster he will either be on a horse or in the back of a ceremonial Land Rover wearing his sword and the remarkable black feather hat. Read the article on pages 10 & 11 of the 2012-13 Goldsmiths' Review: https://lnkd.in/ejy3zPBS

“The hand of the engraver is the hand of mistakes. You need the errors to give the image character — I started engraving down the shank because my hand slipped once while I was working on a ring – Some of the best engraving is done by mistake.” For Goldsmiths’ Stories, writer Kate Matthams Spencer talks to Castro Smith about his creative inspirations, making magic in precious metal, and the power and joy of making mistakes. https://lnkd.in/gM-4_FFc #GoldsmithsStories #Skills #Trade #Craft #Engraving #Apprentice

Today, colleagues joined with people from across the nation in observing a two minute silence followed by a short service of prayer "in sorrow and thanksgiving" on the West Steps of St Paul's Cathedral, London. At the going down of the sun, and in the morning we will remember them.

Members and Staff of The Goldsmiths' Company were out in force today to welcome the 696th Lord Mayor of London Alastair King and experience the sights, sounds and smells (there were quite a lot of horses!) of the oldest, longest, best loved and least-rehearsed civic procession in the world - The Lord Mayor’s Show! 📸: Chris Mann

At 2 o’clock this morning, British Summer Time drew to a close, and the clocks went back by 1 hour - returning us to Greenwich Mean Time. Although this change has no effect on the length of each day, sunrise and sunset each appear an hour later in the summer. This was particularly significant at the introduction of British Summer Time in the early 20th century. According to Royal Museums Greenwich “The idea of summer time or daylight saving time was mentioned in 1784 by Benjamin Franklin, the American inventor, scientist and statesman. However, it wasn’t until 1907 that a serious proposal for daylight saving time was made in Britain by William Willett. Angry at the waste of daylight during summer mornings, he self-published a pamphlet called “The Waste of Daylight”. In 1916, a year after Willett’s death, Germany became the first country to adopt daylight saving time. The UK did the same a few weeks later, along with many other nations involved in the First World War (1914-1918). Within a few years of its introduction, many countries across the world adopted Daylight Saving Time. However, the benefits of it have been an ongoing debate since it was first introduced.” To mark the clocks “falling back an hour” we’ve recorded the beautiful chimes of our circa 1809 Thwaites & Reed three train bracket clock, which sits on the mantelpiece in the Luncheon room at Goldsmiths’ Hall. Listen out for it next time that you visit🎶