Alex Monroe: Into The Wild - Garden Museum

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Alex Monroe: Into The Wild

Into the Wild is an exhibition created by jeweller Alex Monroe for the Garden Museum. It is an exploration of how we engage with our native habitats through drawing and making.

Alex has selected five endangered habitats in the UK and studied each one in detail through sketching, drawing, pressing and making. Working with floral designer Hazel Gardiner he has created a sculptural piece to represent each habitat in the form of portraits or dynamic floral displays.

Alex invites visitors to pause and explore an intimate relationship with nature by offering moments of introspection and time to reflect on our connection with nature, creativity and its effects on our mental health. He also invites us to consider our complicity in the degeneration of our natural environment. The exhibition explores the role of the craftsperson in this process. The observer and recorder who is also a part of nature. The jeweller’s world is slowly engulfed by nature itself.

Into the Wild consists of five floral sculptures. It documents the creative process from sketch book, to bench, to the finished pieces.

Alex will be giving talks about his work and demonstrations of the designing and making process during the exhibition, with workshops for all abilities available.

Dates


Alex Monroe is an internationally renowned jeweller. His work is often inspired by nature and the nostalgia of a childhood in 1970’s Suffolk. He has been designing and making jewellery in his studios in London since 1986.

Alex grew up in a  rambling old house in a coastal village and spent his childhood roaming fields and forests, and mucking about on the river. It was a childhood rich in  freedom and imagination where he constantly crafted all sorts of interesting (and sometimes slightly dangerous) tools and inventions to accompany him on his adventures.

Conventional schooling wasn’t successful. A wonderfully bohemian foundation course in Ipswich led to many failures to study fashion at university. Alex finally accepted an offer to learn jewellery making at the City of London Polytechnic. On graduating he completed a short course with the Royal College of Art and set up his eponymous business in 1986.

Alex’s designs were soon picked up by Japanese and American fashion retailers and the brand continues to export internationally. Hissignature style is instantly recognisable around the world.

Alex Monroe is a keen gardener and this is reflected in many of his designs. He sails his old gaffer boat in his beloved Suffolk, where he walks, cycles, runs and draws. Always drawing. He mentors young jewellery designers, is a Trustee of the Goldsmith’s Centre and regularly writes and talks on the subject of jewellery. He teaches at his own jewellery school in South-East London.