Creativity can make the most meaningful Memorials

I love the positivity of a new year and the feeling of a fresh start. The weight of the past months disappears and I have a burst of enthusiasm and an urge to try new things.

It’s a great time of year for me to design and develop ideas. Sometimes I am thinking about commissions for Memorials clients have already ordered. Once I have chatted about the person, their career, interests etc., my imagination can run free to come up with some ideas for a garden sculpture or something for the home that subtly and sensitively reflects them.

I sketch away like a mad thing until some firm ideas begin to appear. I like to draw up two or three ideas which are then presented to the client as preliminary sketches. After talking these through and gauging their reaction I can design the final piece. Making Memorial art works is a wonderful thing to do on every level, but I think designing is my favourite.

As well as Unique Memorials, it is often this time of year I get together with Sonja  Klingler our glass blower, to work on new designs for our online shop. We think about new colour combinations and themes to use in our glass pieces. We try to imagine what might be a meaningful symbol that might remind people of someone they have lost. The rainbow for example, which we use on one of our Memorial Pebbles, holds many meanings for people, it could be simply the beauty, hope and colours of a rainbow, it may be as the LGBQT symbol, or in recent times it’s connection with the NHS. It connects with many sections of society, so is a great and very popular theme for one of our Memorial Pebbles.

I thoroughly enjoy spending time in Sonja’s glass blowing studio prototyping new ideas. I have worked with glass a bit, so it is a real treat for me to help Sonja to make them. It’s wonderful to watch someone so skilled in action, and then wait to see how the designs come out of the lehr kiln once they have cooled down.

Right I’m off to find my sketch pad and pencils, I can’t wait to get started!