This is the last project for my Year of Repousse personal challenge.  I knew that attempting 12 projects would not be possible and my goal was to complete 6 and with this final piece, I have completed eight.

This was started as part of the FB group (Chasing & Repousse) Challenge #1 - Octopus. 

For this months project, I decided to do an altoid tin as a present for a friend.   I used a palmette which is a palm leaf design that go back to the early Greek and Egyptian civilizations. 
  
This project was completed over the course of 2.5 days.  The lining was done Thursday night, Saturday I started the repousse. Today I finished the repousse, a bit of re-lining and the texturing around the design. 

Project Name:  Tenacious Tentacle 
Material: 18 g (0.40") Sterling Silver

Related Posts:  Take that Sucker!, Disaster, Panic, Call 4 Help, Plan of Action and 2 Diversions, How to Transplant an Octopus Sucker, 
Back to the Octopus, Finishing the Octopus Tentacle

Major Points:
The design was hand drawn and figuring out how to form the suckers was a good practice point. The members of the Facebook group were wonderful in providing ideas, suggestions and support during the set backs and moving forward.  This project was completed over the course of 7 months - it sat for almost 3 months due to other priorities, but I never gave up. I knew I would finish it and holiday weekends are just the time to regain focus. 

Lessons Learned: 

• High relief cuffs are hard to bend and form!
  
• How to solder to repair.
• 18 gauge cuffs are hard to form,  anneal as needed.
• If a challenge presents itself, it is ok to step away and to let the project sit for a while until you are ready to finish it. 

This post is just a week late because I finished the cuff last weekend.    BUT I now have 7 designs. With luck the Tenacious Tentacle will be finished in August which will keep me on track. 

The Koi Kuff is a teaching project as I will be teaching this design as my advanced beginner project. There is not a massive amount of repousse - mostly the fish body and the flowers.  The bulk of the work is the lining cause each of those scales is formed using an extra small curved liner. 

During the repousse, the koi body has two curves that must be taken into account - the curve across the body which is perpendicular to the back ridge of the fish and then the curve long the fish which must tapered to the front and back to give the perspective appearance of the koi swimming toward you. 

I have done this design a 4 times now but each one has one extra step - the lining, the repousse, the chasing, and lastly cut out and riveted to the leather cuff.  Actually I am doing it a 5th time but this one is for me, in silver. 

Project Name:  Koi Cuff.

Material: 20 gauge silver riveted to suede leather.

Related Posts: Prep for class,  Teaching Sample Almost Done

Major Points:

• I started this design back in 2012 but ended up doing the Calamari Cuff instead.  
  
• I put the tabs for the rivets on the outside of the raised circle to not distract from the overall design.
  
• I did the entire design in Adobe Illustrator so I can now scale it perfectly!

Lessons Learned: 

• I need a bit more practice with riveting. 
  
• Bend the piece AFTER riveting
  
• I like doing panels like this because it is enclosed in the circle and then it can be easily finished and riveted to the leather. I will be doing more of these. 
  

A bit late but better than never. I am a month behind but I should catch up later this month.

For this months project, I decided to do an altoid tin as a present for a friend.   I used a palmette which is a palm leaf design that go back to the early Greek and Egyptian civilizations. 
  
This project was completed over the course of 2.5 days.  The lining was done Thursday night, Saturday I started the repousse. Today I finished the repousse, a bit of re-lining and the texturing around the design. 

Project Name:  Palmette Tin.
Material: Altoid Tin which is a soft tin plate (tin plated steel) that is about gauge 28 (.4mm) thick.

Major Points:
These tins are thin! so care must be taken NOT to cause a split or crack. This is the 5th tin I have done and the first had lots of splits and on this project there were NONE. 

Lessons Learned: 
I used Adobe Illustrator to refine the design and I learned how to do a few new things as a result. 

The fifth project is now done and I am still on track with one project per month but this one was close.
  
My long term goal is to make vessels with Chasing & Repousse and this was my second project that falls under this category during my AYoR.  The first project, the tool canister, in this series was the first chasing on a 3-D form I had done.

This project started with a different name which was The Deco Dish but after the patina was applied, the different chased sections with the red just yelled BLOOD ORANGE. 

This project also took several months complete and had many gaps in time due to other projects and workshop sneaking in. 

Project Name: The Blood Orange Dish.
Material: Copper Sheet, Sterling Silver Rim with a Sculpt Nouveau Brown Solvent Dye under coat and the Red Dye-Oxide overcoat.

Major Points:
The dish was sunk by me back in December of 2013. The chasing & repousse was done in January and February of 2014, the rim and patina applied in May 2014. Yes a project can take months!

Related Posts: Tray Good, Counting and Planishing, New Vessel Planished, Deco Bowl, Deco Dish - Chasing Done, Rim, The Patina Predicament 

Lessons Learned: 
Soldering the rim - make sure the rim is large enough in diameter to be centered on the edge of the dish, you can make it smaller but not bigger.
Patina - If working with a new patina, don't learn how to "make it" just before you want to apply it. Set aside several weekends to practice the technique. 

The fourth project is now done and so far, I have completed one project per month. 
  
This project was part of the workshop I went to this month in NYC and I finished it today.  This weekend I trimmed it to size and applied the patina. 

Project Name: The Gilded Age Cuff.
Material: Sterling Silver Sheet with LOS patina.
Major Points:
Chasing and Repousse on a cuff without a wire frame. Layering repousse on top of other design elements that are also "raised". Trimming the excess material around the cuff back to match the shape of the design. 
Related Posts:  Process Photo, NYC Again 
Lessons Learned: 
The layering adds another dimension and extra height to the design. 
 

The third project is now done and I mean completed.   
This project was part of the workshop I went to last month and I finished it 2 weeks ago and this weekend I trimmed it to size, applied the patina and then mounted it in the lid of a wood box. 

Project Name: The  Venetian (Devil) Mask 
Material: Sterling Silver Sheet.
Major Points:
Hammer raised area for the face. 
A traditional "black" patina provided contrast so the details of the face were easier to see. 
Related Posts:  Tucson 2014
Lessons Learned: 
Sometimes a traditional black patina can be good. 

Here is the final piece done, before the patina and then below is the piece with the patina and it is mounted in the box lid

In the Facebook group Metalsmith Coffee House, that I am a member of, a group project was started and I have decided to join in. 

Here is the project description: 
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A Hundred for One. CERF+ Project
Humanity at its best. One hundred souls calling through the woods in the bitter cold to save just one that might be lost. The Vulcans have a saying. "The needs of the many outweigh the needs of one or few." but humanity in it's most beautiful chaos will do just the opposite. This project's seed idea was as a gift translated as best I knew to say thank you. I had no idea that people would even reply. I felt that the sacrifice of time and resource would be too much for many and coupled with the sad fact that the world is saturated with scams I felt maybe two people would participate. That couldn't be further from the truth. 100 links by 100 people is the chain that symbolizes a gift of what humanity at it's best should be known for....That we are not Vulcans and we will do the insane if we feel it can make just the slightest bit of difference.  

Requirements:  

• Size:  No more than 3". It must have holes to accommodate a jump ring that is 10mm outer diameter and 10 gauge or 2.59mm.  Please include connector jump rings.
• Metal:  Varying metals will add character...so, use whatever metal you want.

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The hope is that when the chain is done, a book will be published and that the chain might get displayed in a museum or gallery with all proceeds going to CERF+.

So what is my "link"? It is a small medallion using chasing & repousse of course.   I will not post, at this time, images of many of the links already sent in (because of copyrights and permission and all of that) .   I started this on Saturday morning with a design and now on Monday night, it is 99% complete. I just have to stamp it and then seal it. 

And because of my Year of Repousse project, I can say that project #2 has been completed.

Project Name: Un Piccolo Calamario
Material: Sterling Silver 20 gauge sheet and 12 gauge square wire. Liver of Sulfur patina.
Major Points:
Form frame and solder to sheet.
Chasing & Repousse of design
Saw and file off extra silver sheet
Solder on end links
Patina
Lessons Learned:  
To get sides straight and parallel anneal wire well and pull between to dowels to straighten.
If you put your mind to it, you can get a lot done in THREE DAYS.

Here are the process picture of mine, though so enjoy.  As usual, click a picture to view it larger and to see the caption, then you can scroll through all of them. 

(if you do not know what this is, read this post) 

The first project is completed.   Yes, I admit it, this project was started last year but it was completed THIS year, so I am counting it.  

Project Name: The  Maru Bishamon Tool Canister
Material: Copper Tubing (1.5" ID, ~15g wall), Bronze Sheet.
Major Points:
Raised dome of bronze for the top. 
Soldered dome, bottom bronze plate, and inner sleeve for a pressure fit. 
Chased lines of design and deep chasing of intersecting lines.
Brushed (brass) for surface finish.
Sculpt Nouveau solvent dye in chased areas. 
Related Posts:  Maru Bishamon
Lessons Learned: Use a slightly thinner copper pipe. Solvent Dye bled into the brass brushed lines.

I am at a cusp with my metal work; either I continue practicing or I go for it.

I have made the decision to do the latter not the former.

I am done planning how I will accomplish this and one of the first things that had to be made was the decision to give myself more time, in my studio, doing metal work that consisted of making objects and then decorating those objects with chasing & repousse. To give myself that extra time, meant that something else had to be set aside. My first choice would have been the day job, but since that is what pays the bills in this family (I am also known as the Pig Slayer, cause I bring home the bacon) that was not an option.  I also can't give up sleep so that left weaving and what a hard decision that was. 

This post is titled 'A Year of Repousse' because that is the challenge that I have given myself. I spent a good bit of my travel time, on my way home from NYC, pondering if I could do it and with more pondering and talking my husband and to some of my friends, it seems the thing to do.  

So what is it, this Year of Repousse? 

Let me refresh your memories of those challenges that were going around about 2 years ago called 'A Year of Jewelry' where a person or a community would challenge themselves to do A YEAR OF JEWELRY, and each week they made a new piece to stretch their boundaries. The weekly piece was to either fit a theme or use a specific material, etc. Then everyone would post a picture of the piece they had made and the process that went into making it.

Great idea, but with chasing & repousse and making the object to put the design on, you can't really do a piece a week; certainly not with a regular day job.  Then I thought about what would be a reasonable time period for making a piece and I figured that about a month (plus or minus) would be possible and it would certainly stretch my limits.

I now have what I call the Chinese Menu - two columns of ideas. Column A has the ideas of the designs to be worked and so far I have 14 items in this list. Column B has the ideas for objects to be made, that I can do the chasing & repousse on be it silver, brass, copper, or bronze and this list has 12 items on it.  

Can you see where this is going?

I am now going to pick one item from column A and one from column B and that will be what I will work on and try to complete in a month. Sometimes, it will take me a bit more than a month or I will be away at workshop; other times, it might take me less time than a month to design the piece, make the object, and then do the chasing & repousse on the object, and then finish it.   When I am done with the object I will then take good pictures, write up the description, price it,  and put it up on this website for sale. 

So this is the challenge that I have given myself.   

If you want to join me in this challenge you can, the ride should be interesting.