The Armour Archive

Well our barony was asked to "make a gift box" for one of the other kingdoms royalty, as part of the annual "pennsic gift exchange" ( I wont say who is getting the box, but someone can probably figure it out)

Anyhow... I had the sarcastic / novel idea to actually make a box. So what kind of box? a 6 board chest... but why not go balls to the wall? And decorate it similar to period designs... (see bottom pic) well its pretty much done. I need to attach the front panel, and apply the finish, but that's it. Hand carved in pine, with cut nail and doweled construction. The only power tool used was the saw. Of course this pic is only of the front panel... the whole shebang will be photoed later.

-+G

Nicely done!

a few questions:

IIRC that chest was pretty substancial in size, are you going a 1:1 repro or a scale one?

Was the chest originally completely painted, or are you using artistic liscence to paint parts and finish parts?

The boards look rough, is that just the picture/camera, or are they rough finished?

Are you going to put the legs and feet on the box?

nice work.

cool. i'm looking forward to more photos!

IIRC that chest was pretty substancial in size, are you going a 1:1 repro or a scale one?
I only had the pic to work from (and its b/w) the finished size will be 3 foot long, 1.5 foot tall and ~11" deep

Was the chest originally completely painted, or are you using artistic liscence to paint parts and finish parts?
No clue. Most likely it was all painted, but that's speculation. To th modern eye, it is wrong to paint real wood, you paint particle board and plastic. To the medieval mind, there was no particle board and plastic.

The boards look rough, is that just the picture/camera, or are they rough finished?
they arent rough, I think that's an artifact of the JPG compression you are seeing. The carving itself is a little rough, as wa the original.

Are you going to put the legs and feet on the box?

Yes. It will look very similar to the original pic. (the cut out for the legs is a little more ornate than the wedge cut-out of the original)

nice work.
Thanks. to be honest this is really my first bit of wood work, and definately my first bit of chisel carving.

-+G

Was the chest originally completely painted, or are you using artistic liscence to paint parts and finish parts?
No clue. Most likely it was all painted, but that's speculation. To th modern eye, it is wrong to paint real wood, you paint particle board and plastic. To the medieval mind, there was no particle board and plastic.

_ALL_ wood turns dark brown eventually. No matter what color it started out as. They knew this.

Paint livened up everything. Ever see what the stuff at Luxor would look like, had it not been unroofed and the paints been sandblasted off the glyphs?

Very nice, can you tell us any information about the original, (date, place, type of wood?)

Thomas

The picture says it is a "english chest circa 1500 with late gothic ornament"
No type is listed on the picture, though the credit is from

Mercer, Eric, Furniture 700-1700, (Des Moines and New York: Meredith Press, 1969), figure 142.

So I can look it up next week at school.

-+G

Plenty of cheap good copies of that book on abebooks.com...
I may have to pick it up after I get "The Knight and the Blast Furnace"

Thomas

More pix:

The chest:

<img src="http://imagepronto.com/public/6536/Chest.JPG">

View from the side:
<img src="http://imagepronto.com/public/6533/3quarterside.jpg">

Joinery on the back:
<img src="http://imagepronto.com/public/6534/backjoins.JPG">

Bottom:
<img src="http://imagepronto.com/public/6535/bottomsup.jpg">

Lid (and inside):
<img src="http://imagepronto.com/public/6538/lidreverse.jpg">

(If the pix dont work, click this link: http://imagepronto.com/pupload/view/4195 )

Details:
Construction- 6 board chest (based on existant chests, circa 1500 froma secondary source (photo- http://imagepronto.com/public/pview/6540/mercer142.jpg ) Power drill and jigsaw, balance (dado, decoration, etc) hand carved
Material: White pine
finish: hand rubbed beeswax/linseed oil
Paint: Acrylics
Decoration: Painted carvings primarily based on original with bottom ~1/3 commemorating the occasion (Pennsic war) and royals (backgrounds of Ducal coronets are the backgrounds of the 2 royals arms)

-+G

Well It is with the person who will be carrying it to pennsic. So no more pictures, unless you ask the future owner(s)

-+G

YAYYY! Someone who knows how to drive cut-nails!

Nice work, Rev.

As an aside, did anyone actually get to see the damn thing at pennsic? It would have been either in the posession of TRM Meridies, or TRM atlantia (for whom it was built) I'd really like to know what the recepient thought of it.

-+G