The work of jeweler Christopher Thompson Royds is concept-driven; each theme informs the techniques used. He grew up in the Oxfordshire countryside in England, studying jewelry at London Metropolitan University before completing his studies with an MA at the Royal College of Art in London. After discovering hundreds of pressed flowers preserved as species identifiers in the archive at the Natural History Museum in that city, Thompson Royds was inspired to create, Natura Morta, a series exploring the tradition of flowers as a decorative motif in jewelry. Fragile Thracian crowns of gold laurel leaves have survived millennia, yet the wreaths that inspired the form wouldn't last even one person’s lifetime. The permanence of jewelry and the impermanence of flora influenced him to create this collection of hand-pierced and hand-painted flower necklaces and earrings in silver and gold.
