Inspiring
My longtime pal Ripplin’John sent me photos of his latest project en route to an MFA (at our age John, what were you thinkin’?). Seriously, I am immensely proud that we are friends, my circle of close friends is actually quite small, and of his artistic and technical accomplishments while exploring the realm of artistically integrating wood and metal. Some time ago I gave him a copy of the Matthew Boulton book and is now going to town.
This “lunch box” employs classic boullework techniques, right down to the engraving. In his own words,
I changed the normal procedure somewhat. I printed the drawing on PNP paper and then transferred it to a brass blank slightly larger than the size of the sides. After engraving the brass, I assembled the packet with shop-made veneer and cut out the pieces as needed. Doing it this way meant that I was engraving much larger pieces of brass. Holding the very small pieces after cut out would have been pretty tough.
Each assembly was then glued to another piece of veneer before gluing to the box. This was done to ensure that a failure of the glue up on one side would not wreck the whole piece.
The corners, finial and cheese crackers are cast bronze.
Well done, sir. You can tell him so in person at Handworks where he will be helping me in my booth.
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