Projects from the quarantine bunker!

I am still working full time, but the rest of the time has been spent in the quarantine bunker waiting out these hard times. I was lucky enough to have a good supply of raw materials on hand before the lock down so I was able to keep working on a few projects. Recently I completed two Baronial Coronets for Baron Snorri skyti Bjarnarsson and his wife Baroness Annika Iosafova. Commisioned by Their Graces (at the time Majesties) Timothy of Arindale and Gabrielle van Nijenrode.

 

The coronets are tooled and painted leather. I went outside my wheel house a bit and tried my hand at just painting on the heraldry instead of attempting to tool it first. I did this in large part because I was worried that size and detailing required for tooling the heraldry might leave it looking a bit "muddy" (in other words in might have been so small it was beyond my skill to do well). 

This was a challenging project due to the lock down. I had what materials I had (mostly the leather) and there was zero room for error. There are a lot of small mistakes here and there, but I had to push forward and ignore them as there was no option to start over. In the end I am pretty happy with them, but as with all things, if I had a time machine I would make some changes next time around. 

Well, it has been a damn year...

That moment when you say, "I should really update my blog", and when you do you realize it has been almost perfectly a year since doing so. A big year though. Some sad, but a lot good. A new house, engagement, and many adventures.  I have a large backlog of to-do projects going back several months, but now that the house is a organized a bit, I have started to slowly do some work. Recently I finished this award medallion. This is a medallion for the Order of Thorbjorn's Hammer (Kingdom of Ealdormere). I made one like this for Sir Richard Larmer a while ago, but in true tradition of his generosity, he gave that one away to a new recipient. I wanted to make him a new one to replace the one he gave away. I tried t take a few "in progress" progress shots as well. I have severl other projects on my to-do list in the coming months, so lets hope I can do better than a post a year this time.

More award medallions

I planned to make these Millrind award medallions (SCA AEthelmearc high merit service award) about a year and a half ago. I was distracted by the reign, but finally got around to finishing them. Tooled and painted leather. The edges are black leather dye and finished with water and wax burnishing. Another backlog project off the list.

With the New Year comes new projects!

Going back a couple years I promised my lady Thalia I would make her a favor to wear. To add to this, I set out on a personal quest as well. Our Baronial archery group, The Hael Hounds, has a weekly contest where archers shoot at a small red dot. The three archers that come closest to (or hit) the red dot are awarded a wolf token. I decided that I would shoot in my lady's honor until I had won 20 of these wolves in her name, then give her this token of my love along with my favor for her to wear. As with many things during the reign, time got away from me. However just this week I was able to finally make good on my promise. The favor is tooled and painted leather. The black portion is leather dye. The wolves are commercially available tokens.

Time to get back on track!

Time to get back on track! My duty as Baron of the Rhydderich Hael has come to an end and it is my hope to find more time for projects like this blog. My goal going forward is to focus more on projects that expand my skills and my portfolio, and to work on these projects in a time frame that allows me to really spend time on little details. I want to get away from constant last minute deadlines that force me to work quickly and in many ways steals the joy from doing what I do. Today I present a couple quick updates of projects I have worked on recently. These are an example of what I am talking about. I am very happy with how these came out, but because of my schedule I had to build three items from raw leather to completed project in less than a week and a half. Given more time there are so may small details I could have improved upon. More updates to follow...no seriously, its going to happen this time.

Court Baron Coronet

The coronet is tooled and painted leather. The yellow is leather dye and all the colors are painted. The pearls are mounted into the leather on posts. The back is open for adjustment of size.

Leather Circlet

The circlet is tooled and painted leather. The black is leather dye and all the colors are painted. The back is open for adjustment of size.

Minister of the Lists badge

Finished another project. this is an Æthelmearc Minister of the Lists badge of office. I created this as Birthday gift for our Baronial (Rhydderich Hael) MOL Lady Thalia Papillon. The badge is tooled leather. The badge was dyed with black leather dye and the details painted with acrylic paint. I was very please with the level of detail. I did not make the cording.

Far too long - A quick update!

It has been far too long since I updated this blog. Life (both actual and Society) has kept me busy. I have worked on the odd non-creative project, but never found time to update the blog. I plan to improve on my productivity (project wise), but we will see what happens. I did manage to squeak out a project at the request of Edward Harbinger, completed for the The Scarlet Guard Inn archery festival at the Shire of Hornwood. A simple leather archery arm guard. Tooled and painted leather. Sorry for the quick photo. I finished the project just before leaving for the event and snapped a shot before getting in the car. The leather is dyed Ox blood, but looks darker in the photo. I had a little issue with the dye bleeding into the white paint. I forgot to seal the leather before painting and that caused the dye (Ox blood is a pain) to bleed into the white a bit. Not a huge issue, but the white was not as smooth as I can normally achieve. I was happy with the final project given the time I allowed by self to work on it (no I totally didn't wait until the minute).