Commissioned Sticks

When Raven works on a portrait she often posts pictures of the work in progress on her facebook page so the client and others can follow along on the progress.  I thought doing the same thing on my blog for commissioned sticks would be a good way for clients to see how their stick is going and for me to talk about the process.  So here goes.

I have two sticks I am working on for clients right now.  The first one is a variation on what I call the "gentlemans cane" deign with a wolf head carved at the nose end.  I really like this design because of its versatility, it works as a support cane, as a walking stick or as a crook depending on how long it is and how you hold it.  I showed the original cut out on Sunday the13th and the initial carving on the wolf head on Tuesday the 15th.  Since then i have shaped the main part of the head and added the collar.

It was intended to have a single white horn collar but when i noticed the nice color striped going down toward where the shank will be i had an idea.  I cut off part of the shank end, and put a collar between it and the main part of the head, then another one after the extra wood piece.  You may not see the color stripes well in this picture but i know they will show up well when I add the finish.  I think it will be a really cool look.

This also gives me a chance to talk about my joints.  I usually join the heads to the collars and shanks using a piece of steel all-thread, this adds strength to the joint.  I sand the surfaces that will touch and then carve out a small bowl around the hole the all thread goes through, this bowl acts as a pocket for the epoxy i use to glue the bits together and makes sure i have a good solid bond.  I also coat all the surfaces with epoxy and fill the hole in the head and shank with epoxy.

So now this head will go back to Raven for more carving of the wolf.  The cut out of the other commission I am working on was posted on Nov 16 and i will be showing it as it goes along as well.  It will be a burl maple head, a black horn collar and a stripped hazel shank. Expect to see pictures of its progress soon.