Workshop at Touchstone Center for Crafts

I'm back! I had a wonderful relaxing and inspiring week at Touchstone Center for Crafts in the Laurel Highlands of Pennsylvania, USA.
Take a look at their fantastic blacksmith shop, with twelve coal forges and plenty of space to work.


That's me, demonstrating one of my forged leaves


There's Bill below

Now Skeeter and Henry

I only had 4 students. One left midweek for mysterious reasons. Another, the jewelry shop Resident Assistant, focused on toolmaking. I didn't get any pictures of him. Bill, Henry, and Skeeter, shown above, were devoted and cheerful, ready to learn about chasing and repousse.

This is Skeeter's copper cross in progress. He also worked on a few other designs that I didn't photograph.

Bill and Randy, the resident studio assistant are discussing something. We all did a lot of chatting. That didn't interfere with our productivity.

Bill started off doing the same design in 2 different metals- a great exercise. Bill took this workshop last year, so he was able to skip most of the toolmaking part and get right into the chasing work.
You can see how the horse head shape improved in the steel on the left. He alternated working on them, but finished the bronze one first. Steel takes longer because you have to wait for it to cool slowly after annealing.
Then he started working on a bronze Greenman.




Henry worked on a leaf in steel

and an Angel in bronze

Henry had seen me demo over 8 years ago in Ohio, but had never actually tried the technique. He caught onto the concepts right away and did an amazing job.





With such a self-motivated and talented crew, I was able to get a lot of work done myself. I'll post those pictures in my next blog.
For now, I need to get caught up with chasing tool orders. I'll be unpacking, grouping and photographing tools today and tomorrow, so I can get them up in my Etsy shop. A few peoploe have already contacted me about the tools they want. Feel free to contact me through my blog or Etsy shop if you are looking for specific tools or a set.

Keep checking back for more....

By the way, we are just a few miles south of the torrential rain that fell in parts of SW Wisconsin and SE MN. We did not get the flash floods at our location, but many of our driving routes are washed out or shut down. We can get where we need to go, in about twice the time it usually takes. Pray for our neighbors in Vernon, Richland, and La Crosse counties in Wisconsin, and the six Counties in MN that lost houses and had their property re-scaped by raging flash floods. SE Minnesota got it even worse than Wisconsin.