Working with metal

I’m currently taking a Metal and Glass workshop with nanopod: Hybrid Studio and I love it. I look forward to class each week and having it on Wednesday is perfect for getting through the week.

Tosca Terán is my wonderful teacher and has been working with metal for over 25 years. She was introduced to glass as an artistic medium in 2004. She’s a great instructor and seems to really believe that anything is possible (unless, of course, it really isn’t possible).

During my first week with nanopod I created this band ring out of silver. I measured, cut, hammered, stamped, roller printed, soldered, formed and probably a bunch of other terms the silver. I decided to go with a leaf pattern print and stamped my initials on the inside of the ring.

 

During the second week I came in for a make up class (I had missed the first official course) and worked with copper. We were given a small sheet of copper and I decided to make an origami elephant. Tosca taught us copper-safety, drilling and sawing. Fun fact. Sawing copper, not super easy.

Week three was my favourite! We worked to create wax pieces using the lost wax technique. I decided that I wanted to I wanted try and recreate a maple seed – you know, the ones you would play helicopter with when you were a kid? So I found one on the street for inspiration and picked up some thin sheets of wax.

I traced the shape of a maple seed onto a piece of paper and you can see how thing this wax is. What I ended up doing was cutting out two full outlines and stacking those together. I then added two levels of the seed and spine shapes to both sides to increase the dimension… kinda like lego. From there I worked the wax into shape so that it didn’t look like stacked pieces of wax. I used dental tools and heat to work the wax and develop the texture and details seen below.

I’d say it looks pretty real for making this from scratch, using the real seed as inspiration. From there the wax was cast in bronze!

When I got the metal back, I had to prep myself for finishing it. Meaning wearing a mask and protective eye wear, but my glasses do the job. I grabbed a drill and started sanding down and polishing the casting.

When all was said and done, this is how it turned out. Fancy, fancy, fancy!

I’m super in love with this! Can’t you tell! I think I’ve found myself a new hobby! When I got home I attached it to an old chain I had kicking around. I’ll probably get a mold made of this so that I can make replicates in the future. If you’re interested in getting one just let me know and we’ll work out a deal 😉