Buyer becomes Designer…

Lynne Bannon has recently launched her first collection of jewellery, which is on display at London Fashion Week.

It is a long way from her role as a buyer, in two of the countries leading food Retailers. Lynne spent 13 years in total at Sainsbury’s and Safeways, buying a number of different categories. Her most recent role was being in charge of breakfast cereals at Sainsbury’s. This was a demanding job, having responsibility for £200million sales annually. However Lynne always felt she was a ‘frustrated’ designer, who wasn’t optimising her creative ability.

So when she began doing night classes in jewellery making, she found a new lease of life, and her love for making jewellery was addictive. When Sainsbury’s were cutting jobs and her role became redundant, it gave Lynne the nudge she needed to leave Sainsbury’s and start a new life.

From September 2003, Lynne went back to college to study precious jewellery making and enamelling. By this stage Lynne was in no doubt that she wanted to carve a career out of her newfound love of jewellery.

College finished in June 2004. Lynne came out with City and Guilds certificates in her subjects, and hasn’t looked back since. Says Lynne: “My time at Sainsbury’s was invaluable, I knew the time had come when I needed to do something totally different. Designing and making jewellery is incredibly satisfying. I count myself very lucky that I’ve had the opportunity to retrain as a jewellery maker, and whilst I feel that I have only begun to scratch the surface in terms of techniques, I am delighted that I’ve already had an encouraging response to my designs”.

Lynne Bannon now supplies 8 galleries and shops, including the London Fashion Forum in Kingly Court, and her website address is www.lynnebannon.co.uk.