The British Academy of Jewellery is delighted to announce the continuation of its partnership with the Parlement Lycéen Européen, a network of jewellery schools across Europe.

This year, as part of this ongoing collaboration, the BAJ is once again participating in the PLE’s annual jewellery design competition, which will see students from 12 European jewellery schools express their creativity and compete to impress the judges with their original designs.

The competition is a unique opportunity for students to interact with peers from schools throughout Europe and display their work in an international setting. In this way, it complements the BAJ’s other international initiatives, such as its involvement with the Erasmus+ Programme, alongside six of the 12 schools participating in this year’s PLE competition.

To take part in the competition, students can make a design or an actual piece, or both. Each participating school will select five designs and five pieces to be shown at a traveling exhibition. Due to the current unprecedented global health crisis, this exhibition is on hold but should eventually visit all of the participating jewellery schools, which are based in the UK, Belgium, Italy, Greece, Spain, Portugal, France and Latvia.

The theme for this year’s competition is “The Circle as a symbol of Inclusivity and Unity,” and students are being asked to design or make a piece of jewellery that can be divided into two separate pieces or worn as one.

Entries will be judged at the PLE meeting later this year, when one design and one finished jewellery piece will be selected as the competition’s winners.

“The British Academy of Jewellery’s continued partnership with the PLE offers our students an invaluable opportunity to meet and exchange ideas with students from jewellery schools across Europe. The theme of inclusivity and unity presented by this year’s PLE competition serves as a timely reminder of the importance of these international bonds,” said Kate Rieppel, Head of Academy at the British Academy of Jewellery.

Along with the BAJ, schools participating in this year’s PLE competition include MOKUME Art studies (Thessaloniki, Greece), D.I.E.K. Volos (Volos, Greece), I.A.T.A. (Namur Belgium), Escuela de Arte 3 (Madrid, Spain), FORAL V. Melchiorre (Valenza, Italy), E.A. António Arroio (Lisbon, Portugal), E.A. Soares Dos Reis (Porto Portugal), Istituto Benvenuto Cellini (Valenza, Italy), L.M.M.D. Vidusskola (Liepaja, Latvia), and L.P. Jean Guéhenno (Saint-Amand, France).

About the British Academy of Jewellery

The British Academy of Jewellery is a provider of pioneering jewellery education and training, nurturing talent and technical ability since 1999. Our broad portfolio of diploma programmes, apprenticeships and short courses are to enable professional jewellers and jewellery students to attain top-level technical skills. The BAJ’s campuses, in London and Birmingham, are located in the heart of the cities’ historic jewellery quarters, ideal locations from which to connect with the local industry.