Helvellyn Silver Contour Map Brooch
THE MAKING OF & A TRIP TO THE LAKES
I’ve always loved getting outdoors, getting muddy, breathing the air, enjoying the sounds.
There’s not really anything much that can top lacing up your boots or trail shoes and heading off for a long romp somewhere green, is there?
I usually stick to where I can reach from my backdoor; the lush trails of the Rivelin Valley, the abandoned industrial beauty of the Loxley Valley & the rugged fells of the Peak District. However, top of my list to visit further afield was the widely well loved Lake District.
Since holidaying with family friends in the Cumbrian hills when I was in my teens I’ve always wanted to return to explore some more.
The landscape is timeless; the glittering lakes and soaring mountains have inspired generations of poets and painters to turn nature into art. There’s no question as to why it attracts outdoor-lovers from across the UK and the globe.
So this year, we booked a last minute Airbnb, a cosy newly converted chicken shed perched on the edge of the lush Sprint Valley, not too far from Windermere and the Longsleddale area (if you’d like to stay in the same spot, click here).
We made the journey up to The Lakes on the hottest day of the year, 35℃ and not a whisper of a breeze. We drove up with the windows down, ignoring the queues of traffic to the honeypot towns and whipped out the OS map to scour the area and find somewhere off the beaten track for a wild dip.
The main plan for the weekend was to climb Helvellyn, the third highest peak in England at 950m, after Scafell Pike and Sca Fell. Our hearts were set on scaling it via the dramatic sheer-edged ridge Striding Edge, where the views down into the deep glacial coves either side are well known to be utterly breathtaking. We would then reach the summit, a broad plateau stretching almost a kilometer, then take the Southerly path to Nethermost Pike and follow the horseshoe of crags around Grisedale Tarn all the way around to St Sunday Crag and back to Patterdale. A stunning loop of approximately 18km and a blood-pumping total ascent of 1768m.
The mountain is thriving with important plants & wildlife. Small populations of arctic-alpine plants have survived in spots on rock ledges high in the eastern coves and rare to Britain species of alpine butterfly, the mountain ringlet, also live on and around Helvellyn. Red Tarn is home to brown trout and schelly, a species of whitefish found in only four bodies of water in the Lake District.
On the day of the hike, after the intense heat of the day before dawn broke drizzly and thick with fog. The weather seemed to have switched from summer to bordering on mid-winter overnight! Full of optimism, we left early to make the drive to Patterdale and park up.
As we climbed up from the valley and towards the edge we entered the cloud line and the freezing drizzle gusted in waves. We were out of luck for views from Striding Edge, or the summit, but the hushed, blurry beauty of the precipitous, craggy landscape was enough in itself.
The ridge walk from the blank summit to Dollywagon Pike was utterly biting, I have to say, but then we descended out of the heavy fog and things started to warm up. By the time we made it around to St Sunday Crag the weather was clear enough for a beautiful view across the valley to the edge & summit.
We tottered back into Patterdale in the late afternoon, legs heavy from the hours of rocky climbs. We were happy to grab a coffee at St Patrick’s Boat Landing at Glenridding and enjoy it from a bench overlooking the serene waters of Ullswater.
This spectacular landscape inspired me to create this contour map brooch of Helvellyn, taking in Striding Edge.
I use the OS map of the area to trace the contour lines from the mountain and use this as a template. Made from sheet sterling silver, after drilling tiny holes for the saw blade, all the contour lines are cut by hand using my jeweller’s piercing saw.
The contours can then be formed, the silver pressed into stepped layers to give it the relief of the mountains they depict. The brooch back is a hollow rectangle, handmade by soldering flattened wire into shape, fixing on the mechanisms and making the piece wearable and secure with strong steel wire pins.
The overall effect is that the flowing shimmering silver landscape hovers just above the back of the brooch. It elegantly sits just off any jacket lapel or jumper in a tantalizing way, making for a brilliantly individual conversation starter.
