The movies may be done, but they refuse to upload… so…
In the midst of wet felting slippers and working and cooking corned beef and cabbage and meeting new people… I hid out in my studio.
I turned on my little “fireplace”.
I turned on my heater.
I built a fire in the cookstove.
I flipped every switch and lit up the place… to try my hand at this.
Wire weaving.
A lady does this locally, and I was intrigued, and investigated it more.
I had Vernon pick me up some wire at the hardware store… and I finally had three hours to play with it uninterrupted.
It’s simple enough in theory. Various gauges of copper wire are twisted, hammered, and woven around each other to create a somewhat pleasing shape.
I will oxidize the copper next to give it more depth…
For my first try, I like it. In fact, I think I’m in LOVE.
Find me here!
Oh wow! It’s gorgeous! Making me want it for a pendant!
That is just beautiful. I love it! It really sounds like hard work to twist that metal, though. Please show us what it looks like when you oxidize it. Okay?
I think they are awesome! Very nice.
Carol, this is gorgeous!! You amaze me with all you accomplish. I could picture you in your cozy den with the fire and three whole hours to enjoy your artistic creation!
It’s beautiful! The lines and swirls are perfect. It’s size surprised me when seeing it in your hand. I was thinking wall hanging or garden art. It is wonderful! Thanking the lady above with all the info on how to color it. In our new life, I’m collecting the most beautiful rocks and weathered wood, putting them together with usually WAY too much glue then wrapping with some copper wire. They are getting better. Looks like I’ve graduated from pre-school to about third grade…first week of third grade. But is so fun….plus, sticks and stones are really cheap. Thank you!
Carol!
I love it!
I want to learn how u did it..
How do u have time to do all of the wonderful things u do?
This is very unique, detailed, and a real eye-catcher and conversation piece that YOU created. I think I want one! 🙂
WOW Carol! Amazing.
looks great!
Said it before and will say it again. That. Is. Gorgeous!! You and one of my cousins now have me thinking I have to learn about wire wrapping. lol
I love it. I love how you wound up the ends of the wires. Very Pretty!
That is beautiful Carol. Three hours of pleasure and a wonderful end result. What more can a girl ask for. Will you hang it or wear it – I’m thinking necklace.
Very Nice first piece Carol. I really like the design and changing textures.
And since you’re working in metal I’ll pass on a few things I’ve learned the hard way in my artsy fartsy blacksmithing about patina’s on copper. First is the quality of the patina depends on the cleanliness of the copper. In this situation the oil from our hands generally being the worst culprit. So when/if you try any of this use heavy forceps, needle nose pliers, etc to handle the piece during cleaning and any patina chemicals application.
First a good wash with a tooth brush in hot dish-soapy water will go a long way. Then a really good rinse and dry followed by a dip in muriatic acid (which is hydrochloric acid so BE CAREFUL, NEVER ADD WATER TO ACID). You can buy it at any big box or hardware store. Masons use it to clean calcium chloride stains you see on brick and concrete. Then another thorough rinsing.
Don’t know what you meant by ‘oxidize’ so here’s some color info that was passed on to me:
For Green: Skip the second rinse and just leave the muriatic acid on the piece. Longer you leave it on darker the green will get. Rinse & dry when you want. Liquid solder flux works too instead of the full strength Muriatic acid.
For Red: Get a pan of water boiling. Put your piece on something you can heat but handle to dump the piece into the water. Heat the Whole Piece to bright red and dump in the boiling water. Dump the water & piece after a minute or two of boiling. A propane weed burner torch should work fine for heating. The little soldering torches tend to have too narrow a flame, copper cools fast. Depth of color will depend on the thickness of the metal, even-ness of the heat distribution, impurities, etc.
For Robin Egg Blue to Turquoise: Get a sealable container that will hold the piece. Fill quarter to half full with unscented cat litter of your choice or layered news paper (what I use). Add enough household ammonia to get everything damp but you don’t want standing ammonia, just LOTS of fumes. Saturate a spray bottle of water with table salt. I usually mix it up in a bowl first and pour into the spray bottle. Spray your piece carefully. What we are after is Lots of small droplets of the salt saturated water standing on surface of the surface of the piece. CAREFULLY place the piece in the ammonia container, close and let stand (room temp preferred) for 24 hours.
Of course you want to rinse and dry the piece when you have color you like and I usually (green excepted) spray with a clear coat to seal the piece and stop further oxidation, from handling or the environment…
Hope you find some of this useful…
B
I LOVE the look of this 🙂 But I have to ask…how on earth do you find time for all these amazing projects?!
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