When you're five weeks in and content ideas for the newsletter start running scarce, you begin to question the seamless transition from thoughts to bearable ramblings. Sitting in the newsletter archive is about 35 'first paragraphs' of what I felt were brilliant ideas, but in reality, they would have been more at home written on the back of a dunny door at a rest stop.
As I probably spent more time designing the newsletter head than I have on each entry, I'm going to see this through. Mainly as an exercise of introspection (or exorcism), I'm going to continue to dribble out thoughts, ideas and concepts, with or without a coherent message or value. Comforted by the devastatingly low readership numbers on The Nine Bob Bugle, I know that the critique will be thin and for the few people that are sticking with it, they will have a unique understanding of CHD and what makes us tick. Instead of needing to dangle the proverbial carrot to entice people in with the promise of hidden gems, I'm going to write for the dedicated few who are just keen for a digital yarn.
The dreams of being Hank Moody are crushed with the stark Runkle reality, but Iets crack on with this weeks newsletter! I'm going to give you a run down on what we've got in the pipeline.
- Firstly, something that has been in the works for about 4 months now, a new CHD Clip with local film maker, Matt Hill. Probably the most excited I have been working on a project since day dot. It follows the production of a ring design, from first conception through to final completion. Letting Matt's creativity run amok, led to some proper wild concepts and the execution has been unreal. Two scenes, running side by side, showing the thought process of conceiving a design idea whilst showing some intricate elements of the production process. After seeing the first and second edits of the clip, I can honestly say there hasn't been anyone in or around CHD to perfectly capture the brands personality as well as Matt has. Really amped to have this online soon - should be within the next month!
- Along with the clip above, we will be releasing a small collection of pieces, named the Howlets - which the clip follows the production of. Without ever really having a good Owl ring design, we felt this the perfect opportunity to release one!
- 'Heirloom inspired designs'. We always have pieces in the pipeline, however this small collection of 3 to 4 rings, has been on the back burner for a fair while now and it's close to dropping. The collection is inspired from those pieces handed down from your grandpa. Something that has seen two wars and a great depression. Very simple, clean designs with a centre stone. We want this piece's value to only be truly recognised 20 years deep. A ring to palm off to your kids, after surviving a couple of blackouts and a water-shortage.
- One thing in the very short term that you can all enjoy, is an in-depth educational page that will be running you through some keys areas of CHD, including Production Processes, Designer Residencies, Our Jewellers and a tour of the studio.
- We have mentioned it via our socials a few times, so you may be aware of the 'Try Before You Buy', home try-on service we are launching for the Gold Collection. Really trying to bridge that confidence gap of purchasing online, especially with wedding rings. So let us bring the studio to your door step. We will ship you up to 3 different designs to try on, get your right size and lay out the engraving options for you. This is yet to be done in the industry and I am super excited to launching this for you!
- CHD Customs & Bespoke! Stay poised ;)
As always, we have a litany of projects, designs and new strings for the CHD bow over the next 12 months. Stay aggressively close and I'll keep you in the loop!
- Ryan