BRIAN ASQUITH

Born in Sheffield in 1930 he started at the junior art department at the Sheffield College of Arts and Crafts and gained a scholarship to the Royal College of Art in 1947-51 where he studied in the School of Sculpture under Professor Frank Dobson. National service 1951-3, returned to Sheffield and developed an industrial design practice in 1955 where he shared a workshop with David Mellor until 1960. The 'Brian Asquith Design Partnership', housed in a studio workshop in Youlgreave, Derbyshire combined in the 1960's and 1970's a flourishing industrial design business with production in precious metals. In the late 1960's he was very involved with the Goldsmith's' Company and its extensive programme of overseas exhibitions; in 1967 he took the Goldsmith's Company exhibition to the Lincoln Center in New York and looked after the main exhibit, a Paul de Lamerie dish, in his hotel room before its installation. He began producing his own silverware in 1968; an early commission were items for the Investiture of the Prince of Wales. He has several Design Council awards for both coal and gas fired domestic appliances and they put on an exhibition of his work at the Design Centre in the Haymarket in 1980. He produced a range for Alessi in stainless steel and silver in the 1990's, as well as domestic silver for Downing Street, commissioned by the Silver Trust in 1993 and work for Lichfield and Chichester Cathedrals. From 1963 he lived and worked in the Peak District with his three sons. He designed the Peace Gardens for the Millennium in Sheffield as well as various pieces of street furniture. He was a Liveryman of the Goldsmiths' Company and had a retrospective exhibition at Goldsmiths' Hall in 1993 followed by one in Sheffield's Millenium Galleries in 2004. He died in March 2008.