Meet Annette Gabbedey - Talented jeweller born with no fingers

A talented jeweller whose creations sell for thousands has told how she manages to create her intricate ornaments despite being born with no fingers.

Annette Gabbedey, 48, creates delicate rings, earrings and bracelets, inset with with diamonds, opals and other precious stones in her workshop in Frome, Somerset.

But the expert goldsmith uses no special tools to help her work and says she cannot imagine how people with fingers manage to do it.

Mrs Gabbedey said: 'I'm quite normal and not disabled at all. But I do appreciated that people are fascinated by me being able to create something.

'Making jewellery is very tactile, and something you do with your hands, and people ask how I manage to create jewellery, let alone the day to day things.

'My answer to that is: "How do you manage with fingers?", because they must get in the way.'

The jewellers wears a leather wrist strap under which she slides files if she needs them, and also has a vice to hold pieces while she works on them.

She said: 'I just find a different way of doing things. I have sensitivity all the way through my hands - I can feel everything I am touching and I have got quite a lot of movements in my hands.

'It really is just fingers that I am missing. I've got the joints and the movements which means I have got the dexterity to be able to hold small items.'