Adorn Me! 2010--Day 2 & 3

The two day Found Object Sandwich (FOS) workshop with Thomas Mann was the most challenging workshop I took.  It was also a great experience and I'm so glad I had the opportunity to take it.  He's a great teacher.

I had a tintype from my collection to use for the photo.  I wasn't really sure where I was going with it and hadn't planned a design before class.  The first part of the class was spent getting our photos scanned and sized and designing our brooches. I was looking through the embellishment items when I found a cat and the sand dollar and knew what I story I wanted my brooch to tell.

The difficulties I had sawing the night before had been on my mind.  One of the things I've learned in teaching Pysanky (Ukrainian Eggs) is that most beginners need to avoid parallel lines until they have practiced a little. I usually teach designs with a straight line next to a wavy line.  I decided I should probably avoid parallel lines in sawing until I got better at it. The inside line would follow the contours of the photo and the outside line would be mostly straight sections. 


Thomas Mann demostrating use of center punch.

When I took a sketch of my shape to show Thomas Mann he held my drawing up to the class and pointed out that I had given myself the easiest shape to saw! I hoped he was right.  My straight lines hadn't been very straight the night before.

The first part that gets sawed is the interior line.  My sawing was much better than the previous night!  I don't know why--maybe "sleeping on it" works for sawing.  By the end of the first day I had completed sawing the sandwich. 

The second day I etched the front plate, did some drilling, tapping, riveting, filing, antiquing, and the sandwich was assembled. 


riveting the pin back before assembly

Here she is:



I don't know who this young woman was.  She represents my many times great aunt LaPeyre.  During the 1900 storm at Galveston she gathered her nieces and nephews into the upper floor of the house where they survived the storm that killed thousands. At the height of the storm a chest of drawers floated through the window with a cat clinging to it.  She saved the cat.  After the storm the family moved from Galveston.  They took the cat with them.