I should have some time after this holiday and found this photo that was taken on the Island of Gamla stan in Stockholm, Sweden. My wife and I spent a week's worth of time visiting the Old Town before picking up our car and driving around Sweden/Denmark for 15 days. This shell was on a government building, just as you entered the Old Town from Norrbro street. Good memories!!!

The basswood blank is cut out and ready to carve. Before I start to carve, I always try to lay out the shell on the blank to check out the proportion of everything. Carving from a photo has got it's limitations and many things have to be "guessed" at. For some reason, the drawing of the shell proved to be rather difficult but I gave it my best shot. Next step will be to lower the edges of the blank and then start to carve the top layer of volutes.

Between the snow and helping neighbors, I'm getting the carving done. Here's a photo of the volutes that are being roughed in. I should be able to finish them today!!!

Volutes roughly carved in and the top "step" has been set in. Now, to work on the rays.

Please keep these pics coming Frederick!

Cutting in the separations for the rays. The end cuts will be a challenge because of going against the grain and cutting up hill.

Looking good there Frederick! I see another masterpiece in the works, love it! What size chisels are you using for cutting in the rays? Sweep and size?

4 hours ago, John Morris said:

Looking good there Frederick! I see another masterpiece in the works, love it! What size chisels are you using for cutting in the rays? Sweep and size?

John, sizes are #2,3,5 in 15mm,35mm. Sometimes the #2-15mm will work for a #5-35mm. The smaller the chisel, the easier/safer it is to use.

Some progress made with the shell. Lots of small "touch-ups" will be made before this is finished. The rays have to receive their detailing.

Getting ready to cut some flutes. This will be difficult because of reversing grain direction and cutting uphill and against the grain. Tools need to be extra sharp and the 'correct" sweep selected. I'm also working on getting the plaques ready to turn.

The fluting is coming along! You have to have absolute control over the razor sharp tools and I found that the "curl' of wood, coming off of the gouge, would obscure my layout lines, and then I would have to stop and clear them to proceed cutting. I'm transferring my shell to a smaller carving block in order to do the hinge area around the bottom. It's downhill for the carving now(I hope)!

That is coming along fantastic Frederick.

Amazing work.

Carving done, except for the minor touch-ups. It's amazing what you'll see in a photograph vs. what the eye can see. I got tired of "chasing" whiskers and did the preparations for the 12" plaque. I'll get this turned/finished tomorrow and then take everything downstairs for the prep/paint/gilding work.

That's pretty neat. How much time you got in it so far?

27 minutes ago, Smallpatch said:

That's pretty neat. How much time you got in it so far?

I'm not really sure of the exact number of hours, because I work anywhere from 1-3 hours at a time, sometimes not doing anything for several days. My guess would be about 16-18 hours just for the shell. The plaque might be 1 hour. This time does not include any of the sealing/sanding/sealing/sanding/painting/gesso/sizing/leafing that goes into the finished project.

10-4. It looks like a long job using the knives but is beautiful so far.. 

Plaque is turned, first coat of shellac/sanding done. Now, for the second coat/sanding, then onto the finishing process.

 

Ready for paint/gesso/gold leaf.

Gessoing done on the shell and plaque.

 

The next step is applying the sizing(glue) to the gessoed areas, waiting until tacky, then laying down the gold leaf The gold leaf I'm using is of two varieties. The first is a "PATENT" leaf that will allow the used to gild in the wind. The leaf adheres to a thin paper and is released by pressure onto the substrate. I've cut the leaf squares into 3 strips and will use these to apply to the rim of the plaque. I'll get 9 applications(9") of leaf per square. Using c=2 pi r squared you can calculate the number of strips needed. For my 12" plaque that came to about 38 strips and I always allow extra for the touchups. The other type of leaf is called XX DEEP and is the loose type of leaf. I'll use a brush to trasnsfer the leaf to the nooks and crannies of the shell.

 

Here's the finished leafing around the perimeter of the plaque. Any gold crumbs should be able to be brushed away. I'll paint over, with the black paint, any of those that are stuck to the  wood.