Tutor exhibition: Sarah King’s sculptural jewellery

Sustainable design is very important to Sarah, who chooses materials by researching their ecological implications. “I love playing around with the different properties of materials,” she says. “For me, it’s really important that they’re sustainable.”

“The resin that I use is bio-resin which is made from sunflower seed oil,” she says. Using bio-resin means that Sarah can achieve better optical clarity when making white and transparent pieces because the colour doesn’t turn yellow like other types of epoxy resins.

Sarah previously worked with tropical hardwood but now uses bog oak from Suffolk. Bog oak is formed when trees are submerged in bogs for thousands of years. “Bog oak is a very interesting wood because the tannins in the wood react with iron in the soil and make it a very black colour,” she says.

“I’ve been teaching at Central Saint Martins for 15 years,” says Sarah. “The classes I run are creative and suitable for beginners as well as more experienced students. They’re designed in a way that everybody can enjoy.”

On the Wooden Jewellery With Silver and Pearl Inlay Short Course, for example, students learn how to make contemporary sculptural jewellery pieces using wood with silver inlay and pearls.

“Silver inlay is very effective and surprisingly easy to work with,” says Sarah. “We usually start with a pendant – everybody can achieve something quite stunning in a short period of time.”