as i was a little rushed setting up for open studio, i feel a couple of our pieces that we finished last week deserved a few more comments and photos, so here they are, along with some other photographic highlights from the weekend ... click the photos to enlarge them ... above the open studio shop photo is a better photo of the claro wlanut slab table we had on display this weekend. it is leaving tomorrow with the ladderbacks to spend the summer at the vermont visitors center in guilford. a lot of folks (about 600,000 stop there per year) enter vermont from massachusetts and connecticut on route 91, and we're hoping that some of them will see our work and contact us with new commissions .. it seems like we ought to be able to get at least one or two out of 150,000 or so. summer's a good time here ... this is a close up of the under structure with our new base design using polished and welded 5/8ths" rebar. people almost smiled when they noticed the rebar ... it fits in with our 'bethlehem steel' and 'bridges' series too. for the copper table, which was the other big furniture hit of the weekend, we started out with a 1/2 size model a month or so ago. i did that on my own nickle, even before i actually got the commission for the big table. i figured i couldn't go wrong with whatever i wound up with, and i was intrigued with the clients' concept as well as my concept for executing their ideas. it also was a test of my local sheet metal shop on the execution of the design ... the clients loved the model and i even found a half size chair mockup i made a long while back to contribute a sense of scale. this is it in the raw and our only objection was that the copper didn't lay perfectly flat and 'humped' and rattled occasionally, a problem i expected to get worse as the individual sheets doubled in size. i also figured there are only so many nails you can apply before it would look too 'naily'. so, our solution was to get some weldwood contact cement and glue each copper piece to the plywood and 2 x 10 substrate as we went along. before we got our veneer bags, this was our typical process for installing central inlays in our dining tables. it also works great for male/female lamination forms. these are mostly 2 ton hydraulic jacks you can get quite cheaply on line or at your local hardware. i think i have about a half dozen. be sure to support the table underneath before cranking them up. the last little bit of design was stablilzing the two base pieces and supporting the 9' span, which we did with sam's help and a little twisted and welded steel ... tah dah ... after sanding and sort of polishing the copper and the nails with some red 5" round scrotchbrite pads we found at the hardware store, we applied a chemical called liver of sulfide (outside please... rotten egg smell) and today, after some back and forth, i oiled it with a polished on coat of linseed oil which blended the fingerprints from the weekend and made it look like a beautiful old penny. i absolutely love the look and i have a couple proposals to send out for other sizes and different bases. liver of sulphur is available from dickblick art supply. clean the copper first with dish soap and a little ammonia. follow the directions and rinse neutralize (2 spoons of baking soda to 2 cups of water) the copper when it looks they way you want it to. the initial cleaning seems really important ... here jim patinas the 1/2 size mockup. you can clearly see the before and after here. a view down the table's 11' length ... it's off to Connecticut tomorrow ... and we have a 10' claro walnut table that is virtually finished, slightly ahead of the house where it is going to live. it needs only a final topcoat and some polish. i thought about setting it up on its base for the weekend, but it's really heavy, and the shop was too full, and maybe we'd drop it, or someone would scratch it ... in the end, we left it on edge, covered with soundboard and only occasionally allowed interested visitors to have a peak ... enlarge this one. it has a great fiddleback figure over its entire length and is without a doubt the most consistently figured slab i have ever seen. we did set up its blackened base though .. folks are always amazed at the minimalness of the structure, but that is made up for by the weight of it. steel prices have skyrocketed lately though and that is the reason we are exploring other base deisgns like the rebar above. just the steel and the cutting was $1800. and then the pieces still have to be drilled and tapped, ground and polished, sanded, patinated and finished, a process that almost doubles the cost of the steel. i get a lot of inquires on these, but few takers. sam's spark screens above and will's custom banjos below were also much discussed items. he's got a pete seeger type longneck in the works at the bottom of the photo above. the fretboard for that one is as long as the entire new 'daffodil' picolo banjo below. skin head, nylon strings, canary wood inlays, antiqued brass hardware, warm tone. kit's jewelry is back in the safe and penny's paintings are back in her home gallery ... the rhododendrons and peonies are blooming, most of the garden is in and dinner is done ... lights out ...