Graduating from the Edinburgh College of Art in 2013, Elizabeth spent part of her third year in Canada where she produced a range of enamelled jewellery, including cloisonné pieces. On returning to Scotland she wanted to make larger more sculptural pieces incorporated into jewellery. Ceramic honeycomb seemed to be the perfect material for this kind of work.
Elizabeth Campbell has developed a technique for enamelling ceramic honeycomb, producing a new range of original and exciting pieces. The ceramic honeycomb is actually an industrial heat-brick which Elizabeth and many other jewellers have used as a support for soldering for a long time.
Elizabeth dedicated a lot of time to experimenting with metal and various materials to create sculptural 3-dimensional enamelled pieces, and found the honeycomb gave the perfect combination of lightness, sculptural possibility and, importantly, the ability for enamel application.
She discovered that if she mixed liquid and ground jewellery enamels she could get the enamel to adhere to the honeycomb, although with some colours this could be achieved with just liquid enamel or jewellery enamel alone. Often the enamels need some persuading to adhere to the honeycomb.
Because she likes their colours she generally works with Thompson enamels and began using their lead-free enamels in Canada, where strict health & safety regulations prohibited the use of lead bearing enamels in the college studio.
