Wednesday, September 13, 2023

REPURPOSED CLAY AND WOOD

This is one of those spur of the moment, let's see what the heck will happen if I try to repurpose a squared Oribe vase and turn it in to a covered piece with a wood and copper lid and as you can see here are the results, neither great nor terrible. I had made several of these vases some while back and this one got pushed to the back of a shelf and basically forgotten about until my superior wood working skills needed some flexing and I decided to make a wood lid for the piece. The wood was from a scrap piece of old cedar from several houses back that was cut to shape and then with the aid of a rasp, two small chisels and some sand paper was worked to fit the form and sit inside the lip of the ceramic piece. After some vigorous sanding the wood lid was "lacquered" using a stained polyurethane and made ready for the addition of a copper loop handle by drilling two oval slots. The copper loop handle was made by taking a piece of thick copper wire (scrap) and hammering it flat and then bending it to the desired shape which accentuated the hand hammered marks on the surface. The copper was then set with two part epoxy and there you have another wood lid which all told, cost nothing as everything was on hand or scrap excepting perhaps a little over an hour's labor or so. As I keep reminding myself, I am no woodworker and should just stick to clay but now and again what is the worst that happens, you waste an hour or so and I can live with that.