Originally Posted by
george wilson
You do beautiful and realistic work,Zach. I guess we just go about it by different means. At my age,with several things wrong with me,I'm not going to hand plane wood from the rough. And,like you pointed out,wood was available in man thicknesses back then. Today,we are stuck with just a few.
But,I will say that it is the skill of the worker that the finished product depends upon. I have made parts for harpsichords on order from the curators that fooled every one of them as to which was the original. Then,they got all exercised about it,and wanted me to SIGN each part I made. I did so. They are going to have a great time of it if my main patron dies and leaves her collection,full of parts I made,to the museum. She did not want me to sign them.
I ought to take down the picture of the lock: The picture does not show the surface very well.
I had to make a very large lock,about 9" x 12",for the state capital in Richmond some years ago. No pictures,sorry. I used a really old,beat up sheet of brass,polished it a bit and left it full of little dings. They had the RANDOMNESS that only natural years of being in a pile of other metal could bring. Fakers most often fall way short of properly distressing surfaces. That is a main short coming(among many others!) So,if I can get a piece of dinged up brass to make a lock,I'll use it.
On another occasion,I fixed up a lock for Bruton Parish Church. Old locks get too worn out to work after 200 years. I've done a fair amount of messing around with old locks. And,the available reproductions do not fit the old place on the door,worn from the lock being there. I think it looks horrible to put a different size lock on an old door.
Right on, George. I appreciate your kind words.
No one has the qualifications to question your methods or your results and I am certainly not doing so. Your body of work speaks for itself and no can disagree with that. And you are 100% right, at least in my experience, that fakers fail to get the surfaces right. I think that they most often trade in fantasy and "it is what I want it to be" syndrome in the head of the buyers. If they took the time to study the work, most fakes (and most reproductions too) stick out like a sore thumb.
Your endgrain is like your bellybutton. Yes, I know you have it. No, I don't want to see it.