This story is about an item of ornamentation known by some as a hairspoon. This client called upon me to make a copy of something she had noticed upon a trip to China. The original is just that, a large metal soup spoon which is bent to match the curve at the base of your skull. This particular form is only useful for people with extremely long hair. The hair is braided in a single long rope, preferably down to the waist and then wrapped around the axis length of the spoon. As you twist the spoon upward, approaching the head, you stop wrapping in one direction and wrap at a 90 degree angle to the previous wrap, say clockwise around the previous wrap. When all is tight you twist the spoon upward and the curvature of the ornament snugs in nicely against the base of the skull. This woman, whose last name is that of a large migratory bird, wanted several of these made with different bird motifs. The Chinese name for this ornament is essentially that of “Bird’s nest” so this was the design I presented.
I rarely work in bronze but the customer and the design said otherwise. Bronze doesn’t feel quite right to a metalsmith used to working with silver and gold. It’s very sticky when worked with files, it’s very smoky when cast and feels dirty when sanded. The end result is quite nice but the journey… Because this casting was larger than my equipment could handle, I had to structure it in two halves. Each half was carved and fitted with, of all things, dovetail grooves and then soldered together. The whole was then textured with a rough feather-like surface and set with onyx eyes. I don’t like to use stones as eyes because they usually look cheesy but in this case they were just right.