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Archive for 2016

Engraved £5 notes worth £20,000

Engraved £5 note

At Engravers Guild, the feature-piece of many of our personalised gifts is the custom engraving. The individual message is what makes it unique and creates a special exchange.

However, we could not help but be impressed by an engraver in Birmingham, whose work you cannot even see at all.

Graham Short, the world famous ‘micro engraver’, creates engraved images so small that they cannot be seen without the aid of a microscope.

He came to attention when inscribing the entirety of the Lord’s Prayer onto the head of a pin, and his latest commission could create a windfall jackpot for some lucky people this Christmas.

To mark the launch of the new £5 note, Mr Short painstakingly carved tiny portraits of Jane Austen onto the special notes, next to the images of Sir Winston Churchill and Big Ben.

Reported by the Birmingham Mail, it took two weeks to engrave the images on each of the four £5 notes, with the painstaking work being carried out at night when the vibrations from traffic are lower.

An art exhibitor who has previously shown similar work, estimates that each of the four £5 notes now in circulation could be worth over £20,000.

So before you hand over that crisp polymer note the next time you’re at the tills, pull out your magnifying glass first to check that you don’t have the real-life ‘Golden Ticket’.

Launch of new engraved pen collection

Engraved silver fountain pen

William Makepence Thackeray, the nineteenth century English novelist said: “There are a thousand thoughts lying within a man that he does not know till he takes up a pen to write.”

We are delighted at Engravers Guild, therefore, to help men and women discover these great thoughts with the launch of a new engraved pen collection from Clewley on our store.

Clewley pens are a pleasure to behold. Made in sterling silver, they are manufactured in Birmingham on machinery which has been used since the 1800s to create British fountain pens.

The company pays homage to the rich heritage that the city has in pen manufacture. At the turn of the last century, Birmingham was the world’s largest producer of pens, accounting for half of all writing instruments across the globe.

Today, there are few companies in the UK that have retained the skills required to deliver a world-class pen, and we are pleased to work with Clewley in offering a special item that can be made a truly unique personalised gift.

Each engraved pen from Clewley is presented in a beautiful case, and accompanied by a personal gift card in the Engravers Guild gift box. As a graduation gift, a wedding gift, a gift of congratulations on a promotion, or even just a gift for Christmas or birthdays, there can be no finer memento of that special occasion.

Engraved cufflinks fit for a King

Engraved cufflinks for Duke of Windsor

Engraved cufflinks have been the mark of distinguished gentlemen for centuries.

No more was this true than for the Duke of Windsor. Formerly King Edward VII, he embodied English style and was the most photographed man in the world for a time.

His sartorial sense defined the gentleman’s attire of the day, to the extent that even the way he tied his neckwear took on his name – the Windsor knot.

Another essential part of his wardrobe was his cufflinks. His cufflink collection was one of the greatest in the world. And prize amongst them were his engraved cufflinks.

He owned the most expensive set of cufflinks ever sold at auction. It was a set made by Cartier London that consisted of double sided cufflinks engraved with E & W.

On the back they were engraved Edward 23/6/35, and Wallis 19/6/35. Estimated to bring £70,000 – 90,000, the set sold for a record £115,250 in 1987.