Radical Jewellery Makeover: A Conversation with Susie Ganch & Kathleen Kennedy

Radical Jewellery Makeover Scotland

The Scottish Goldsmiths Trust launched the Radical Jewellery Makeover (RJM) across Scotland in late 2021 in partnership with Ethical Metalsmiths and is supported by Culture & Business Fund Scotland and Jamieson & Carry. The project is due to conclude with an exhibition in Glasgow in late March.

RJM Scotland has seen over 40 generous donations of old or unwanted jewellery from across the UK and 115 participants from six Higher Educational colleges across Scotland, who will transform this ‘urban mined’ material into desirable jewellery.

We spoke to Kathleen Kennedy and Susie Ganch, Co-Directors of RJM, to learn more about the origins of RJM.

Tell us why you started this project

Susie:

Radical Jewelry Makeover was created by Christina Miller and myself back in 2007. We joined forces when we realized we were both concerned about the large amount of waste generated by the jewellery industry. We also wanted to investigate the supply chain within the field and know where our materials were coming from. RJM is a project of Ethical Metalsmiths. EM was founded in 2004 in the US, the same year that Earthworks launched its ‘No Dirty Gold’ campaign. Their report brought attention to the environmental and social harms of the hard rock mining industry. At that time, they reported that 1 gold ring created 20 tons of waste rock. RJM was a way to get into the studio and find solutions through making and innovating within a field that was and remains mostly unsustainable, with the exception of initiatives such as Fairmined and Fairtrade.

Why is it important for us to learn about where materials come from?

Kathleen:

In the US, hard rock mining is the dirtiest industry. Jewellery is a 24-billion-dollar industry, and whilst small incremental changes toward sustainability have been made since the beginning of the project, the supply chain from mine to finished product remains incredibly opaque. We often have no way of knowing what lands and which people may have been harmed by the jewellery we wear, unless these products have traceable supply chains with clear policies enforced to protect mining communities and their local environment.

The current reality is that there are two worlds in jewellery. First there is high-end: where gold, silver and platinum are infinitely reusable materials. In the current world, we aren't doing that enough! Secondly, we have fashion jewellery where the core tenet is short-term use, so by design, they are meant to be trash.

RJM Scotland Sorting Days, January 2022

How does RJM address concerns around supply chains in the jewellery industry?

Kathleen:

RJM celebrates non-exploitative labour, working in communities, and protecting the environment. Through RJM, we create a transparent supply chain that starts in local people’s jewellery boxes! People mine their jewellery, digging out their unwanted pieces. Putting them back to good use in the hands of jewellers who take the time to innovate and work with this difficult material!

Each instalment of RJM receives about 45kg of jewellery. This begs the question: do we really need to keep mining for new material? The project demonstrates how circularity could work. RJM elevates materials with reuse potential versus those that have been made with materials that cannot be recycled. We don't care that it’s gold; we care that it's reusable. Jewellery is one of the oldest forms of communication that exists, so it is a very powerful tool to communicate change. The project operates on generosity: donors who put their unwanted material back to good use and the students and professionals who work together as refiners and designers, devising innovative ways to work with this material that has had a previous life. We turn what is unwanted back into what is wanted!

While the project is fun and celebratory, it is also a way to explore what is possible and to interrogate the systems that we currently rely on. Recycling isn't new, but what is new is our awareness of the impact our actions have on people and the planet.

What do you hope the legacy of RJM projects will be?

Susie:

We hope individuals realize that change starts locally and the importance of supporting local artists and local projects. Consider your habits of consumption: we don’t need as much as we think we need. One chain made from gold or silver vs. 10 chains made from plated base-metals, for instance. For RJM to have a true impact it needs to be hosted in jewellery programs and jewellery communities around the world! Explore welcoming the RJM project to your area to influence jewellery makers and jewellery wearers everywhere to think differently about the materials we wear! These materials tell our stories but also have their own important stories and histories.

We also hope for better data on the benefits of recycling metals, that costume jewellery companies improve designs and their transparency of alloys so that the products could be more easily recycled. For example, manufacturers and sellers of fashion jewellery could establish buy-back programs to bring circularity into the system - clothing brands are already leading the way on this.

Lastly, our true hope is to influence makers about changing their habits, how and why they make. RJM hopes to create a culture of sensitivity to honour the materials we use. We want to keep materials out of landfills where they will sit in perpetuity. We want circular material systems.

RJM Scotland Pieces by Gary Logue; Liz Willoughby; Saipranathi Sreeram
Images by Stacey Bentley

Where is RJM traveling now?

Kathleen:

RJM is currently traveling to Brazil; Boston, Massachusetts, USA; the North Carolina Museum of Art in Raleigh, North Carolina, USA; the Houston Center for Contemporary Craft, Houston, Texas, USA.

Thank you, Kathleen and Susie, for sharing your RJM journey with us.

For more information about the Radical Jewellery Makeover: