The SunCat Makes Art

Cutting a sheet of 8 leaves takes about 30 minutes if the metal is being finicky. There are 6 sheets.

Laying out and tracing takes about 20 minutes a sheet. And there are 6 sheets.

If I do the wheat twist for the base, it takes about 2 hours to form, twist, and wrap the base band.

So far, I have 3 actual leaves done with stems not including the 2 I did for my examples for Kingdom A&S.

Right now, I'm looking at approximately 7.5 hours into the project with what I have done so far, and there is much more to do before I'm done. I'll likely time how long it takes me to chase and repousse a leaf, too, since I'm tracking my time.

(Photos for the algo. Stitch insists on supervising from my shoulders and a pic of my workspace.)

All 6 sheets of brass leaves are cut out.

That means there are 47 leaves cut out.

Phase 2 done.

2 of 6 sheets of leaves have been cut out so far. 4 more to go.

I'm going to cut the rest of the leaves out, then build the stems. After the stems, the details on the leaves will get done.

After the leaves are fully done, they'll take a ride in the tumbler to de-burr them before they're formed for attachment with a "soft" mallet.

I just reblogged 2 posts made in memory of Duke Thorbrandr Olaffsson.

To most people, he was a giant of a man (literally), but he was so much more: A fierce warrior. A kind father. A loving husband. An honorable king. A devoted friend. A heart-brother.

This morning, as I finished my personal travel coronet, I stopped to admire the work on it. Some of the skills that I used to craft it were taught to me in the last year by Thorbrandr, better known to those in his circle as T-Bone, and I shed tears, knowing that I would never be able to show him the work I'd done on it.

Over the last 4ish years of knowing T-Bone, I grew as both a person and as an artisan. My life is richer for having known him. Not because of the skills and wisdom he helped me cultivate, but because he was just a Good Person and he genuinely wanted the best for people.

I don't entirely know where this post was going. What I do know is that I'm going to try and stretch my artistic wings further and work towards becoming a more refined artisan. I was going to do that, anyways, but there's probably going to be an echo of "What would T-Bone tell me?" now.

I'm going to miss his wry smile as he looked over my pieces and would tell me they were good enough to cut up. It was his way of telling me that they looked like artifacts -- that I'd done well in my attempts to recreate Viking age jewelry -- and if he didn't say that? He'd give me advice on how to work them further to get to that point.

Hi there. I'm Samii, also known as Samson Muskovich in the SCA. I currently reside in the Kingdom of Northshield and live in the Barony of Caer Anterth Mawr (though I travel frequently outside of the Barony). I'm a leatherworker, metalsmith, and cook.

The metal coronet on my head is my most recent project, literally just finished this morning.

Anyways, I figured I might as well pop on here and actually make a post. The plan for this blog is to try and chronicle my projects and commissions for the SCA.