Some new castings

I've been doing some pewter casting lately to add accessories to my 16th Century equipment. Little things like buckles and buttons, as well as attempts at medals and pins. I say attempts because those haven't worked so far. The buttons and buckles however, have.

My wife and I worked on doing some roughs of different buttons from finds ranging in dates from 1300's to the early 1600's. After doing the molds and getting everything set here is the first picture of the small button suite, not cleaned up yet.


From left to right we have:

1. Ridged Cone - 16th C
2. Pyramid - 16th C
3. Ball - 14th-17th C
4. Lantern - No providence
5. Acorn - 16th C
6. Shallow Dome - 14th-17th C
7. Cross - 15th C

I also very pleased to have purchased an original 16th century buckle from Talbot's Fine Accessories. I made a mold of it and the first result is great. I plan on using this on belts and hangers.



So some other fun stuff I've been working on. I've got some larger buttons ready to be cast in the next day or so as well.

Sword hanger with flair!

This past summer I made a hanger that had my first attempt at pierce work on the leather. It turned out pretty well and I backed it with a rich gold cotton velvet to make it stand out. I ended up cutting out 4 more hanger parts this weekend and picked one to try an experiment on.

I wanted to do some more pierce work and also try doing some tooling work. I've never done tooling before but I saw how a friend of mine did it, so I figured what the heck. This is my second attempt at pierce work and my first at some basic geometric tooling on a hanger. So far I like how it looks. It isn't perfect by any means but its a good start, and with practice I think I'll get closer to what I have in my mind's eye and really enjoy what I'm producing.

Because these posts are useless with out pictures...


A wide shot:


A bit of a close up on the work area:


What's that on the left side? Oh it may just be some buttons Heather and I are working on to cast.




More pictures will be forth coming. Its set to be a 5 buckle hanger, I just need to figure out what color to choose.