Wendy Ramshaw (1939- 2018)

Wendy Ramshaw was a sculptor and jeweler. She was born in Sunderland, England in 1939, and first studied illustration and textile design at Newcastle’s College of Art and Industrial Design from 1956-1960. She later switched to industrial design while attending Reading University, in 1960.

Ramshaw always saw jewelry as a creative outlet for her ideas. Her earliest pieces in paper were sold with much fanfare by the fashion design Mary Quant in her hip boutique, London Bazaar, in the 1960’s. It was this work that pushed her to go back to school and study at the Central School of Art and Design in London. Interested in making more one of-a-kind pieces, a commission for a ring featuring one large moonstone led her to design her groundbreaking clustered, stacking rings on turned pillars. Each one is an original, for its use of gemstones and for announcing the idea that jewelry can be displayed and appreciated as art when not worn on the body. The ring sets propelled her career and allowed her to grow creatively. Throughout her artistic life, Ramshaw designed on both small and large scales,` turning to public art commissions later on.

In 1993, Ramshaw was one of only two women to be admitted as Freemason of the Worshipful Company of Goldsmiths, and in 2003, was awarded an OBE for her services to the arts, as well as the title of Commander of the Order of the British Empire.

In addition to her numerous titles, Ramshaw’s work has been featured globally in solo exhibitions. She has work in the public collections of The Victoria and Albert Museum in London, the Schmuckmuseum in Pforzheim, and the Musée Des Arts Décoratifs in Paris, the Museum of Arts and Design in New York, among numerous others.

Read more about Wendy Ramshaw and her contemporaries in our catalog, London Originals, available for sale here.