Rustnstuff

Friday, November 16, 2018

Past halfway

I got a solid amount of time in the garage-studio today. This enabled me to finish off three more Artisan Lamps that I got started yesterday afternoon. That makes six now - so I'm over halfway to my goal of ten.

I'm quite liking this series - most tend to be a little smaller and have a good quirk factor.

A couple of photos of the selected pieces for two of the lamps before grinding and polishing etc.

Photos of the assembled and wired lamps

good feeling to have got that far at the end of the day. Though I could not leave the garage-studio before giving it a though vacuum and putting tools away - the place was a mess - need a clean space to get moving on the next four lamps.

Wednesday, November 14, 2018

The delights of early mornings

Because we are heading towards the longest day of the year the sun is up early and that means we wake earlier. The morning had soft light and was cool - there was a trace of moisture still on some of the blossoms.

My walk uplifted me - the beautiful aspects of nature can have a way of doing that.

The photo below shows the unusual morning light in the valley

Sunday, November 11, 2018

Developing our skills

Fiona and I have just spent two days at a bookbinding workshop with the Queensland Bookbinders Guild. I had done some bookbinding many many years ago. So really for both of us it was the opportunity to develop our bookbinding skills which will complement the letterpress work we do with Deckled Edge Press.

Following are a few images from the couple of days

And a couple of my bound journal which I made from beginning to end on the course.

It was a great learning experience with generous and skilled teachers.

Friday, November 9, 2018

Three out of ten completed

Over the last few days I have been making moves to assemble 10 Artisan Lamps. I'm making ten because that is the number of globe holders I have. The process as you know usually starts with getting a whole heap of potential bits and pieces on the worktable so I can run my eye over them and begin the process of deciding what goes with what.

I had sorted the design of three of the lamps on Thursday afternoon and made a start on two of them. Today I managed to complete three lamps. The photos below show the chosen bits before grinding or sanding and polishing.

Photos of the completed three - including new electrical cords and globes.

As you can see these lamps focus on the strengths of some of the pieces like the mincer in one; the large industrial cotton reels; and the antique gas light fitting. A good feeling to complete these today.

Sunday, November 4, 2018

Ladles - hammered bowls meet twisted brass rods

Over the weekend I managed to start and finish a stash of small ladles - 9 in fact.

One of the things I like about the ladles is taking some pretty ordinary silver-plated metal and being able to form shallow vessels from it; and then bring out the beauty with hammering; grinding and polishing.

I surprised myself with the making and riveting of the solid brass rod handles I managed to do this task in about 2.5hours.

And the ladles looked good when they were assembled - hammered vessels meet the twisted brass handles.

Just a last bit of a grind to ensure that none of the rivets sit proud and then they are ready for market.

Friday, November 2, 2018

A whole lot of grinding

I didn't get a lot of time in the garage-studio today because of community commitments.

I did get to finish the stash of Leaf-spoons. When I was over at the grinding-polishing bench I realised that there was quite a bit of work and maybe skill in taking the rough fold-formed leaf-spoons and turning them into beautiful smooth objects.

I asked Fiona to take a 10 second video of the grinding wheel and a little bit of the process. But of course I could not load it in its uncompressed format; and life is too short to spend too much time on such matters. See my Facebook page for the video.

Anyway after a couple of hours of grinding and polishing the stash of Leaf-spoons emerge.