Christopher Thompson Royds
Biography
Artist and jeweler Christopher Thompson Royds’ designs take the humble wildflower and elevate it into a precious piece of adornment. Christopher crafts necklaces, earrings, and brooches inspired by wildflowers’ strength and beauty. He explores the tradition of flowers as a decorative motif in jewelry and the associated themes of permanence and decay, as his objects and jewels immortalize the evocatively named flowers that decorate Britain’s hedgerows and verges, like meadow vetch, hop trefoil, or a lady’s smock. His Natura Morta collection takes its cues from the pressed flowers that he discovered within marble-paper folios at London’s Natural History Museum’s Herbarium, which collector Sir Hans Sloane had sent back from the Caribbean in the late 1600s. Christopher’s more recent works merge jewelry and sculpture to create works of whimsy and surprise; beautiful enough to stand on their own as objets d’art, delicate gold daisies that reach for the sky on fine stems of gold reveal detachable earrings and a pendant as form and function seamlessly and exquisitely unite.
Christopher Thompson Royds first became passionate about making jewelry while at school, and attributes his interest in nature - and the depiction of it in his work - to his upbringing in the English countryside. He has an MA in Goldsmithing, Silversmithing, Metalwork and Jewelry from the Royal College of Art, London, prior to which he studied at London Metropolitan University. Today, Christopher is an artist and jeweler of international renown, whose work is included in several prominent collections in Europe and the US, including the Victoria & Albert Museum; UK, CODA Museum; NL, Schmuckmuseum; DE, National Museum Zurich; CH, and Museum of Fine Art Houston; US, Rotasa Collection Trust; US. He is represented by Louisa Guinness Gallery in London, Mahnaz Collection in New York, Irene Belfi Gallery in Milan and Galerie Marzee, Nijmegen, and with them regularly shows in these cities, as well as at fairs such as Collect, PAD, Design Miami. His work has been featured in Vogue, the Financial Times, Town & Country, the Telegraph, amongst others.
Works
