I really didn’t have an inkling 9 years ago when I chose to learn more about our Anglo-Saxon heritage and teach these Anglo-Saxon theme jewellery making workshops for the Landscapes Project quite where it would lead or the incredible journey I would have…
Is it our destiny that pulls us in these directions, moves us by chance onto these different paths?
Destiny, fate, chance whatever you want to call it, seems to play a major part in my life, as so much of what I do seems to happen by accident. When I retrained as a teacher 16 years ago, I thought I would just teach basic design and photo-editing. I had no idea that two years later I would begin to specialise in teaching jewellery making and teach it at a number of colleges, groups, galleries and organise/run my own bebeady classes for over 10 years.
Learning about the Anglo-Saxons and teaching my jewellery making workshops for the Landscapes Project for the Forest of Bowland AONB really helped enrich my knowledge and broaden my horizons. It was the start of something amazing that linked my teaching with my design skills, jewellery making and my interest in our ancient ancestors.
My Anglo-Saxon adventure continues – 3
So after teaching the workshops at the Lindisfarne Gospels exhibition in Durham, it was followed in 2016 by being asked to teach some workshops as part of the Warrior Treasures, Saxon Gold / Staffordshire Hoard exhibition at the Leeds Royal Armouries Museum. They’d also discovered me online via the Landscapes Project (sadly it’s not online anymore).
These workshops were longer, for a day instead of 2 hours and inspired by some of the Anglo-Saxon designs in the exhibition – that was decorated with double spirals – I developed some further wirework jewellery designs.

I’ve already written a few blog posts about this particular journey, my teaching and Staffordshire Hoard exhibition visits:
- 1- The Staffordshire Hoard
- 2- The Staffordshire Hoard spirals
- 3- The Staffordshire Hoard spiral workshops
- 4- The Staffordshire Hoard Mysteries of the Bearded Man
What happened next was very wow! I couldn’t believe it when last Summer I was contacted by the British Library, which resulted in me travelling down to London in October 2018 and January 2019 and teaching my Anglo-Saxon jewellery making 1-day masterclasses as part of their iconic Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms exhibition.
“If there is ever a good example of the benefits of writing a blog, I think this is it… as I asked how they found me and it was from doing a google search and my blog posts and websites were there!”
It was super exciting, but I also put in a fair bit of time in preparing myself for it; learning more about the Anglo-Saxons, developing further designs for the masterclasses and ordering/organising materials etc. It was also way outside of my comfort zone… once I’m actually teaching I’m ok, as I feel happy when I’m demonstrating or helping students, but talking/presenting I find much more difficult and my brain often turns to jelly with my words coming out jumbled up or not at all. Thankfully both masterclasses went really well and I was very proud of myself for facing my fears.



What a wonderful opportunity it was and so totally unexpected. Plus I got to visit the fascinating exhibition for a quick look before I went around with the workshop participants pointing out pieces of particular interest and inspiration for the masterclass workshop designs.
Well, there is a little bit more to my Anglo-Saxon journey, that involves my own jewellery designs and my new business name, which I will share in my next blog posts, come with me on my adventures…
Read my other blog posts:
Wishing you sparkles of light!
Thanks for joining me on my creative journey,
Sam Rowena, jewellery artist x
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