Inspiration for cabinet pulls from insects and animals

Browsing the Pinterest site I came across a word that I didn’t know the meaning of and this took me down the wonderland path to the origins and meaning of “memes” and how it differs but can be a source of inspiration. On that journey I found the term was coined by an evolutionary biologist, Richard Dawkins to describe a cultural element analogous to a biological gene. The word meme can mean any idea, fashion, picture, song, etc. that is propagated and communicated and in so doing takes on a life of it’s own. As it spreads people often will change it by putting on their own spin it. Think of the spins made on joke cartoon memes where in the telling of the joke a different animal or ethnic group is creatively substituted by another person to make a different audience laugh. Like biological genes the cultural meme will mutate as it spreads.

Hawk moth imitated in cabinet hardware - nature as inspiration

If memes are the social equivalent of biological genes where does nature as a source of inspiration fit in? Our finely detailed cabinet pulls with few exceptions have in some way been directly influenced by our appreciation of nature. Plants, animals, insects and other physical entities when taken collectively are how we define nature. In our new website’s cabinet hardware section we have grouped our pieces accordingly into natural categories:
Animals
Flying creatures
Plants
Flowers
Textures
Hedges

Nature imitated in bronze - dragonfly cabinet pull

If you look at the different categories the influence of nature as a source for these creative designs should be apparent. While customers like our work we can not describe the pieces or the pictures as memes as they appeal to a select small audience. Given that our work including our photographs are all copyrighted and original we also hope that it will not be propagated without our permission to do so.

Custom Appliance Pull

We have now completed the custom Willow Appliance pull as can be seen from the photos here.
The custom pull was created by joining the right and left Willow cabinet handles to create the desired length of 17”. The length of the pull and shape of the sprig were perfectly suited to create this new item without our needing to substantially redesign the sprig and without the need to create a new pattern or mold. As discussed in an earlier post (Jan 16,2020) the new pull was created by melding and tooling 2 wax sprigs to create a single piece that was then shelled with several coats of a silica slurry before being fired to create a rigid shell.We cast these pieces in silicon bronze and then finished them in 3 different ways. The first photo below shows the effect achieved by finely buffing the bronze with successive grits of sanding compound. The deep undercuts created by the willow leaves create a shadow that adds subtle depth to the finished piece.

For a more dramatic pewter look we finished one piece using a full strength black oxide and gently removed a little of the solution around the edges of the leaves to create a very soft bronze glow, you will need to zoom into the second photo to understand what I mean.
For maximum contrast we finished the third piece with bold contrasting bands of black oxide that we removed in adjacent areas to create a striated piece.

Custom cabinet hardware and the challenge of creating steel replicas of pewter castings

We were recently commissioned to replicate cabinet handles from the 1920’s for use in other areas of a home being renovated. It was not possible to establish the base metal used for the originals without damaging the pieces and our best guess was possibly the castings were made in pewter or nickel. While the metal alloy did not impact our ability to replicate the shape of these 3 cabinet pieces it did present us with interesting patina and finish choices.

We began the project by carefully cleaning the originals so that we could get a good impression in our latex rubber mold. As the pieces were small simple shapes we were able to make a single two-part mold that would accommodate all 3. We could have made individual molds for each piece but given that we were making less than 50 pieces this would not have been cost effective. We made a simple mold and after cleaning the originals sprayed on a release agent making them easier to later extract from the latex mold.

The photo below shows the red waxes that were made from this type of mold using Westech’s V510 wax V510 that has melting range of 185° to 195°. The originals were made for different screw threads, but the replicas need to suit modern needs so were drilled and tapped for a uniform 8-32 threaded screw. Stainless steel is an excellent durable alloy but needs to be heated when applying Birchwood’s M20 dark patina. As an added measure we baked the pieces in a clear matt enamel to protect the patina and give a very subtle sheen.

After Patina Applied and with Clear Enamel Baked On

In steel before finishing and in red wax