It was just another normal week at the end of May
It was just another normal week at the end of May. Our discussion group was led by the amazing Rob Faure Walker, with a fledgling crow/raven/rook (TBC) on his shoulder. Acoustic night provided our seasoned musicians and a few newbies with their fab forum of fun. The live music Thursday blew us away. Ann Liu Cannon (a Wiltshire goddess) and Esme White (one from t’other side o’pond) mesmerised us with their contrasting styles in perfect unison. It was an honour to host them here as they embarked on their ‘Shotgun Wedding’ tour. Poetry evening provided the darkness and joy that seems to represent this world so well these days. I even sang.
Despite my best attempts to lure the village to finish the keg of real ale for free after my Temporary Event Notice had finished, it was a lovely couple from Swindon who stopped after visiting the Crofton Steam Engines that had a go. One was a biologist who alerted us to the rare Purple Emperor butterfly that may be spotted in our beloved Savernake Forest in late July. Design and Nature often go hand in hand. My bro designed an engagement ring (Wow!) this spring, complete with a butterfly wing setting. I have used the design in a silver, topaz & amethyst version here. Our very own Purple Emperor!
As our amazing project gathers pace, we will be open as a gallery, cafe, pub and, of course, event space 24th evening to 28th evening in June. Come and visit. I am grilling everybody at the moment for info to make sure that your new local community hub provides the entertainment that you want or wish to provide in future, so, whether you want to perform or spectate, cook or eat, play or listen, brew or drink, create or purchase, pop in and tell me all please. The best opportunity will be on Father’s Day, 15 June, free entry and an opportunity to listen to our acoustic and poetic locals, a sound bath accompanied by snacks and drinks.
Live music fans are in for a treat this summer. Veterans of last year will remember the wonderful Chris Alcaraz and his spectacular contribution to this space. Not only is he coming back in July but his great friend, Giulia Millanta, is teaming up with Ruth Theodore for an acoustic performance on 26th June. Very limited numbers of £15 tickets are available so please snap them up and tell like minded friends. This is going to be a very special evening! On On.
March Events
Smithy Art Forgery presents a plethora of treats this month.
LILA TRISTRAM live! Acclaimed by EARMILK as “one of the most powerful and unique artists we’ve heard this year,” Lila Tristram brings her hauntingly beautiful songwriting to The Smithy for a special solo show.
Tonight, experience Lila at her most raw and intimate—Stripping her songs back to their essence, this performance will be a chance to hear them as they were first written: inviting the audience into a world of brooding intensity, delicate melodies, and quiet power.
Thursday 27 March | 6-9pm | Tickets: £10
In addition, we will host our usual monthly Smithy fireside evenings.
STILLNESS SPEAKEASY “Cycles of Life & Nature”
Free entry | Tuesday 25 March | 6-9pm
Jonathan Harrison will introduce the subject to stimulate the group’s thoughts before we all get involved in the discussion with our own contributions. Jonathan describes it as a Satsang environment, a gathering of good people for the performance of devotional activities. This will be a fascinating debate! -
ACOUSTIC FIRE GATHERING
Wednesday 26 March | 6-9pm
Bring yourself, your instrument, your voice or just come and enjoy.
POETRY EVENING
Friday 28 March | 6-9pm
Whether performing or listening, come and enjoy an evening of poetry and other forms of creative writing.
WELLBEING WEEK
Wednesday 26 - Saturday 29 March
Wednesday
2pm - Breathwork
Thursday
11am - Meditation
1-4pm - Tarot Readings
Friday - 10:30am - Cacao Ceremony
1pm - PandoraStar Light & Sound Bath
Saturday
11am - Yin Yoga
2pm - Breath & Sound Bath
4:30pm - Meditation
To book any of these events, please contact Guy at the link below.
Food (including vegan options) available & Licensed Bar for all events.
Rooms are available for those travelling from further afield. The Snug is a double room with a shared bathroom. The Smithy is two rooms, one double and 2-3 singles with a shared bathroom.
We very much look forward to seeing you in a week or so!
Retreats 2025
Whether walking the Pewsey Downs National Nature Reserve with blue skies above on the frozen sheep shorn grass of winter or the lush and colourful wild meadow flowers of summer, the spirit of Wiltshire will sooth your bones, being and beyond. For thousands of years, pilgrims and travellers have been coming to these hills, drawn by the energies which spawned stone monuments to the sun, moon and stars, like Avebury, just to the north, and Stonehenge, fifteen miles to the south.
The science is simple. The low hills have a thin crust of chalk on their crowns, providing little resistance to the universal pull above and the earth’s molten core below. Add to this a gigantic aquifer, just below the local valleys floors, and a surge of electro-magnetic energy pervades which makes its visitors feel great. In the heat of the summer, plasma orbs of white energy can be spotted, often flitting around the still inexplicable phenomena of crop circles. These extraordinary but temporary temples to sacred geometry and divine prophecy proliferate more greatly here than anywhere else on this planet.
Smithy Art Forgery, with its roaring forges from fall then cooling bliss from spring, provides the most nurturing base from which to explore the natural magic that pervades. In addition to its cosy beds, the 375 year blacksmiths’ thatched cottage, workshop and garden provides a haven for all varieties of artists to perform and showcase the very best in local culture, art, jewellery and wellbeing. Home cooked food and local ale are provided for sustenance too. We are modelling our retreat holidays, for 6-9 people, around this beautiful framework.
Following the monthly success of her Poetry Evenings, Kit Birks is hosting her own two night adventure in early April, ‘Earth & Ink: a retreat into Presence, Poetry & Nature’. The experience is designed to guide you back to your Self and the Natural World through guided meditation, group Reiki and outdoor writing practices inspired by the local beauty around us. Beds, food and drink are provided for poetry pilgrims from afar or day passes are available for literary locals. It matters not if you are a novice writer or Booker Prize winner, this retreat is for one and all.
We are also delighted to announce that our favourite pagan princesses, ‘Mary Magdalene’, are hosting a weekend retreat to honour the Goddess Eostre. This two night retreat includes a day of yoga, meditation, nature and sounds with Lila and Annie, plus tickets to their beautiful public concert on the Saturday evening. Beds, all food and drinks will be provided. Guests will leave on Sunday morning in time to reach family or friends’ Easter luncheons.
Lila continues the good work on the first May Bank Holiday with ‘Awakening the Creative Spirit’. This beautiful long weekend retreat includes three nights accommodation, all food and drink, Lila’s personal guidance for yoga, meditation, body-mind and creativity focus, nature and music. Her public acoustic concert, LILA TRISTRAM live! is also part of the experience on the Saturday evening in the Smithy. This is the most magical way to spend the early May Bank holiday.
For those wishing to experience the full pantheon of Smithy Art Forgery pampering, our monthly ‘Wiltshire Week’ retreats are available from the end of April. Whether you wish to stay for 2, 4 or 6 nights, the week is segmented to include historic sites and nature walks, lectures, music and poetry evenings, all food and drink, single and double rooms. Come and stay as an individual, couple or group. It is not a suitable environment for young children. Peace and quiet will prevail when the artistic, cultural and spiritual celebrations are over! In addition to this plethora of bliss, the garden’s yurt (AKA The Temple of Transcendence) has a full programme of wellbeing activities available including Breathwork, Cacao and Chanupa Ceremonies, Cranial Sacral Therapy, Dreamcatcher Workshop, Drum Circle, Meditation, PandoraStar Light & Sound Bath, Tarot and Yin Yoga. Contact your host, Guy Shepherd , to plan and book the perfect additional package for your stay in advance please.
Guy is a jeweller, dreamer and romantic. These qualifications and Smithy Art Forgery make this the perfect setting for your bespoke ‘Romance Retreat’. Whether you are planning an engagement or anniversary, a four poster bed, homecooked cuisine, sparkling champagne and sparklier jewels await your stay. With over 30 years of experience making fine jewellery and nearly 20 years as proprietor of the Smithy, your host will make sure you and your partner have the most perfect celebration. Contact Guy Shepherd to diarise and plan the details.
Smithy Art Forgery is a haven for the arts and these beautiful retreats are the best way to experience your personal favourites. Before you book through our website, have a look at our Crowdfunder page to benefit from the relevant retreat rewards and 10% discount offers.
We very much look forward to welcoming you in the spirit of Wiltshire.
‘T’is the Season to be Jolly!
Painting of The Old Forge by Alix Booth
For the healthier amongst you, Breathwork, Cacao Ceremony, Meditations, PandoraStar Light & Sound Bath, Sound Bath and Yin Yoga sessions are all available this Saturday 14th to next Saturday 21st. Contact your guides here. Ivan is also ready for Tarot readings at your convenience.
Inside the house, I will be serving some seasonal fayre including my infamous Rudolf Ragu... Vegan options too. Acoustic Fire Gathering is on Wednesday 18th. Bring your instrument or voice or just come along and enjoy the sounds while we sit around the Forge furnace. After the success of our first poetry evening, Kit and Natasha will be hosting the second on Friday 20th. I will be running the Licenced Bar. Bring your own or another's written word and share your art. Details of the event here.
N.B. Folk Music Eve has been postponed. Despite significant demand, supply is impossible as they have double booked. Doh! We will get things slicker when we resume in late February, I promise.
On that note, I recently passed exams towards a Personal Licence so we should be able to keep this beautiful vision rolling forwards with more frequency.
Please remember that if you have friends travelling from afar, we have rooms available for mini breaks and more elongated holidays too which coincide with all the magical happenings at my ancient home.
With the usual serendipity here, my heartfelt thanks to Alix Booth for choosing Smithy Art Forgery as the scene for her beautiful Christmas card.
See you all soon.
Guy
Diamond Circular
The rotating image above is a 1.00ct H colour Si clarity round brilliant cut diamond. You and I do not know whether it is Certified, Parcel or Laboratory grown. That’s because they are practically the same. So, what are the differences?
I grew up the son of a diamond merchant. In the 1980s, my father and his business partner were amongst the very first to start trading in Certified stones. Due to cost implications, these stones were almost exclusively larger sizes and the better qualities. It was of enormous benefit to their West End retail clientele to be able to prove how close each diamond was to being perfectly colourless and flawless. Up to that point, the skill of the diamond merchant and retailer was to sort and evaluate Parcels of stones without certificates.
18ct Yellow Gold Tree of Life 8 Claw Studs
When I joined them in the 1990s, they taught me these sorting skills and our inventory of certified stones grew from larger rarer stock to include smaller more commercial eye clean sizes in time. An increase in demand for the Certified stones ensured a premium price over the Parcel goods, despite them being identical. I began to manufacture wholesale jewellery and by the 2000s had teamed up with my brother to create GUY&MAX in Mayfair. We only used natural stones. There are few stores that market synthetic sapphires or emeralds, despite their availability for decades. In our eyes, the romance of a crystal growing for millions of years outweighed the overnight test tube variety.
Diamond was the last major gem to be synthesised. The current fad is for Laboratory grown stones. I appreciate that they are far cheaper than naturals but the current retail to resale value of approx 15% makes it attractive for fun seekers rather than longer term investors. Market parity is sure to follow and retailers and consumers will decide whether it will suffer the same obscurity as its coloured counterparts or the roaring success of cost effective cultured over wildly expensive natural pearls.
18ct Rose Gold Crescent Moon 4 Claw Studs
As I look over my thirty plus years in this fascinating trade, there are multiple directions that every individual can turn when purchasing diamonds including Certified, Parcel and Laboratory. Currently, guaranteeing that the science of grading stones is accompanied by total trust in supply, I recommend my own loyal patrons indulge in Parcel sorted natural diamonds. They are what they are (and the grandchildren can always get them Certified down the road), the hardest natural substance, the most romantic gesture and the most beautiful crystal on this planet.
Examples
The following examples are all for pairs of round brilliant cut white* eye clean** diamonds, weights are total (e.g. 2 x 0.50ct = 1.00ct), H-I* colour, Si** clarity and are set in 18ct White, Yellow or Rose Gold Stud Earrings. Prices are UK £ and include VAT.
18ct Yellow Gold Tree of Life 6 Claw Studs