Have you ever wondered about all the different things I use to produce my work? You may be aware that I use acrylic and wood in my jewellery, or that it’s laser cut, but what about all the tools, materials, gadgets and sundries that go into designing, making and selling? Here are the top 10 items I use to run my small business, from design stage through to shipping.

1. Sketchbooks and fine liners. I design all of my jewellery (some laser cut jewellery makers buy pre-designed files online). I’ve never had much success with design software like Illustrator or ProCreate. Instead, each of my designs starts with hand drawn pencil sketches. I re-draw and refine, ending with a detailed drawing in pigment liner pens. This stage enables me to work out the construction and I’m pretty good at visualising how a piece will fit together now. Because I hand draw using rulers and protractors, rather than pre-set shapes in a computer programme, it means my work is rarely symmetrical - even the pieces that look regular are a little ‘off’, which I like. Is it old fashioned? Yes, it’s positively early 20th century. Could it be done more efficiently? Absolutely! But it works for me right now.

2. Laptop and printer. My laptop was the first big re-investment I made into my business and I didn’t buy it until 2020. I chose a Mac so that I could use design software (the joke of course being that I still can’t use that software). I couldn’t afford a new one, so I bought a refurbished one, plus a keyboard, mouse and monitor so I could have a desktop set up. I use my computer daily to update my website, buy materials, answer emails, keep records. You might think that a printer is virtually obsolete in the digital age, but they still have their uses: I still have to scan documents and print out order receipts to include in parcels.

3. iPhone. I launched The Cluttery in 2017 and for the first three years I ran my business on my iPhone. If I needed a computer I used my work desktop during lunch breaks (while I still had a regular job), but for the most part my phone was sufficient. I use my phone daily to snap and edit product photos, place orders on the go (like when I’m out and remember that I desperately need 200 paper bags), update my website and Etsy shop, make Instagram posts etc. Having the laptop has made some things easier, but if I had to, I could still run my business on my phone.

4. Laser cutting machine. I don’t own a laser cutter. Instead, I send my design files to a local service (Slice Laser Studio), along with my acrylic choices in a ‘cut list’, and they cut and post it to me. This way I don’t have to maintain and house a large machine, or store lots of acrylic sheets. I don’t view this as cheating as the designs are all my own, plus it’s a common way of running laser-cut jewellery businesses now. I love opening parcels of newly cut acrylic and wood components. Each little piece has to be ‘peeled’ of its protective paper before I can use it and this can take hours, so I often do it while watching tv in the evening.

5. Acrylic paint and paint pens. I use both acrylic paints and paint pens for different jobs. I use pens for filling in the etched details on acrylic pieces and for adding the punchy colours to the Floral Folk collection. Pens are useful because of the range of nib sizes available and because the paint in them is quite opaque, so it takes fewer passes to make colours pop. I mostly use Posca pens, but I have a cheaper set from The Works that includes some nice, albeit less opaque, colours. I use acrylic paints for subtler finishes or for when I want to make my own tones. For example on The Lovers cloud earrings I hand paint the night sky in layers of blue, purple, silver and pale green. I tend to use Liquitex Gouache, Pebeo Studio and DecoArt Americana brands.

6. Glue. Most of my jewellery requires glue, so I buy quite a lot in a year. I glue the studs onto earrings, and in jewellery with more than one component, like the Sky At Night hoops, I glue the individual pieces onto a base. Most of the glue I use is epoxy resin (Araldite or E6000), but I also use superglue for some jobs. I tend not to use plastic glue (which fuses two pieces of acrylic together) because it melts the mirror effect off the mirrored acrylic. I learnt that the hard way.

7. Bench tools. Like all jewellers I use hand tools including files, pliers and wire cutters to construct my pieces. I use files to remove sharp burrs; pliers for opening and closing jump rings; and wire cutters for cutting chain. I also use a Dremel drill for making holes, polishing, and creating a brushed effect on metal, as with my Tassel pendants.

8. Packaging. I use packaging to help create my brand. I have business cards, ‘acrylic care’ cards (mini leaflets of care instructions - water is a big no no) and display cards which I use as packaging for small earrings. I use gift boxes in various sizes to package necklaces, brooches and larger earrings, all of which I buy from UK-based Tiny Box Company. For online orders I use 2.5cm thick ‘large letter’ parcels that fit through letterboxes, meaning I can keep postage costs down for my customers.

9. Label printer. In 2023 I made a £100 investment that has saved me untold amounts of time - a Polono thermal label printer. For the uninitiated, this is a dedicated device for printing the franked postage labels I buy online from Royal Mail or via Etsy. It doesn’t require ink cartridges either. I know, amazing! More than a year later I still whisper “I love you, Polono” each time it spits out a perfect adhesive postage label.

10. Card reader. At arts markets these days most customers prefer to pay by card or their Apple device and many don’t carry any cash at all, which is a bad idea if the wifi is patchy. Some makers refuse to take cash a markets, but I think that’s both bad for business and it disenfranchises people. A lot of kids use cash and so do people buying secret gifts while their spouse isn’t looking! Also, some people have no choice but to use cash (maybe they only have a basic bank account) and I don’t want to cause anyone embarrassment. So I take card payments with a SumUp card reader that connects to an app on my phone and I happily take cash payments too.

This list is by no means exhaustive, in fact, I don’t think I could list all the stuff I use during the course of a month of TheCluttery. I haven’t included all the jewellery findings, stationery, sundries and display equipment I use, not to mention the digital resources and inspirational books I consume. All of these materials, resources and devices must be factored into my costs of course, so this list at least goes some of the way to explaining both the work and the financial outlay involved in running a small business.

Resources:
Slice Laser Studio in Birmingham is temporarily closed, but there are plenty of other UK laser cutting services.

Tiny Box Company is based in East Sussex and stocks all sorts of packaging boxes and bags.

SumUp Card Readers link to a phone app for easy card payments and charge a 1.69% transaction fee.

Polono Thermal Label Printers are cheaper now than when I bought mine in 2023.

Cass Art , Birmingham branch, is where I buy my painting and drawing materials, and they have a website.