Year of The Wood Dragon

The Chinese Year of the Dragon began on February 10th, 2024, continues until January 28th 2025.The Chinese zodiac follows the moon and is divided into 12 year cycles. Each cycle is represented by an animal which includes a rat, ox, tiger, rabbit, dragon, snake, horse, goat, monkey, rooster, dog, and pig.

 The English word zodiac dates back to the Roman and Greek periods and  the 12 symbols represent the months of the calendar. The word zodiac derives from the Greek word zōdiakòs kýklos meaning circle or cycle of animals. While the zodiac signs do include a ram, bull,crab,lion,scorpion, and goat, the signs actually represent the Greek Gods and rather than following only the moon they follow the paths of different star constellations.

In the Chinese zodiac the 12-year cycles represented by animals are also associated with the five elements; wood, fire, earth, metal and water. In Chinese philosophy the ancient philosophers believed that we could understand our world by looking to these 5 types of energy and how they change. This is the year of the Wood Dragon which is considered the first phase in the cycle of growth and that is aptly depicted by the Chinese symbol for tree.

 Our inspiration for the dragon door knob came from watching Game of Thrones and from Daenary’s wonderfully animated fire- breathing friends. Their depiction as powerful scaled beings was central to our much smaller dragon. At a height of 3” and weighing 2lbs and based on the dragons’ wing length of being 196’ I have guessed our bronze version if scaled to this size would be an impressive 20-ton creature.

In honor of the Wood Dragon, we have created a scene using our Hedgerow trees to form a landscape to celebrate this year.

Inspiring Entry Door - Bee Door Knobs and Insect Art

Choosing the right doorknob for our new insect paneled entry door was not a difficult task as we have 4 styles of animal and reptile to choose from. The carnivorous lizard would have been an obvious choice but as he occupies center stage on our entry gate, we decided to opt for the bumble bee knob.
The bumble bee is cast in bronze and we finished this set with a dark oil rubbed patina which plays well with both the red and black colors of our entry door. To accentuate the bees round abdomen and eyes and to highlight the ridges on the honeycomb back plate we lightened these sections for contrast.

The honeycomb back-plate can function as both an escutcheon for the bee knob or as trim that can be used to house a keyed cylinder. The bee knob when turned activates a latch that opens the door and when released keeps the door closed. The honeycomb is machined to take a spindle that passes through the port of the latch to activate the latch and to keep the knobs firmly attached to each other.

The honey comb for the keyed cylinder is machined on the outside with a large 1 3/8” hole to house the keyed cylinder and on the inside with a small ½” to house the turn piece that enables the door to be locked or unlocked from the inside. If you study the photo of the inside trim you will notice that the turn piece is styled on a small cockchafer beetle.

Our entry door took several weeks to create and our posts document how the panels were created so if you want to turn one of your doors into a gallery of bird, animal or flower paintings then please do read our earlier posts of japanning and gold leafing. Needless to say there is no limit to the subject matter for decorative panels, so harness your imagination and create something fabulous.

Japanned Gold Leaf Panels with Bumble Bee Knob