A piece of the Ruhr region to take home: Trained goldsmith Birthe Deilmann fulfilled a dream in 2020 and founded her label birdykreativ. Since then, she has been designing and handcrafting various accessories that have one thing in common - a direct connection to the Ruhr region, the home of the Essen native. Deilmann sells her work at trade fairs, city festivals and in her online store.

In her studio in Essen Kupferdreh, she creates individual music boxes, mine scarves, ceramic boxes and bags, among other things. All products are based on motifs from the mining industry, which was so formative for the region. For example, the "Der Pott kocht" ("The pot is boiling") pit-cloths: each cloth is unique and the lettering is applied using a screen printing process. While the miners used the cloths to protect bread and thermos flasks from the fine coal dust underground, today the mine cloths with their characteristic checked patterns are sought-after kitchen accessories. Deilmann's music boxes also take up the miners' song - probably the best-known song of the miners in the Ruhr region and throughout Germany. The drum of the music box is screwed onto a hand-crafted oak board with laser engraving. If you turn the metal lever slowly clockwise, the well-known miner's song is played. Coal wagons are also an integral part of the history of the Ruhr region: they were used to transport coal and stone from the mine. Birthe Deilmann makes small silver wagons as pendants for key rings and necklaces. Her engravings, typical of the Ruhr region, are hand-blackened and form a deliberate contrast to the matt silver.

www.birdykreativ.de

Photos:
Birthe Deilmann

(Published in CUBE Ruhr Area 04|22)