Cloak or dress hooks

I picked the original example of these hooks in Essex (it's the one nearest the scale). It's a lovely piece made from rolled bronze sheet which has been turned and sharpened at the ends to form the hooks. The side pieces appear to be held on only by the tightly wound wire. In the versions I have made, which are slightly more robust, the hook is made from bronze wire, and the side pieces (which are brass) have been soldered in place, then over wrapped with fine brass wire.

Cloak hooks, with original piece nearest the scale, £8 each

The dating for this piece was placed by the seller at around 17th Century. My own feeling is that is a little older, possible Tudor, but I would be interested to hear from anyone who has seen anything similar? PAS didn't throw any light on dating...

Bone Lucets

Just finished a new batch of bone lucets (more are on the way!)...

All the bone (and antler) lucets I make are different. I don't force the material to fit a given profile, so they are far more organic in form than the boxwood lucets I make. This means that occasionally they may look a little.... odd? But sometimes odd is good; after all, isn't it good to be different? The lucets have been sanded and polished to bring up a nice, smooth finish, but they will mellow with time and use and take on a much richer patina.

All my bone lucets are priced at £12 each, regardless of size. The longest is 110mm, the shortest 60mm.

Boxwood

Time to start prepping some more boxwood for pomanders...

cut blocks ready for turning

end view of one block showing some water staining, and (unfortunately) some rot

the other end waxed to show the grain more clearly

The rot around on edges of the wood is not found as frequently as on other woods. Boxwood is hard and dense that it largely resists water - there is a good chance that some of this damage was done in storage during the winter. It will mean turning from a larger piece, but the resulting pomanders will have an interesting variety of colours in the surface.

Knitting needles

Now available!

150 mm / 6 inch bone knitting needles £7.50 each

200 mm / c.8 inch needles also available £10 each

The above hand cut and shaped bone needles are 2 mm (approximate) diameter. Hopefully, 3 mm will be coming soon!

website updated...

....as if there weren't enough buttons (!) I have added a couple more and updated the links

Products

Prices remain competitive, and I am always trying to increase my range of products so if there is anything you don't see on the pages/price list please give me a nudge and I'll see what I can do!

:-)

Boxwood combs

Finally getting back to some comb-making...

These two will be going up on Etsy shortly

Restitched...

Katy's collar was starting to look a little shabby - she does like to roll a lot! - so I spent last night taking it apart and re-stitched it. While I had the chance I gave it a good clean and re-oiled it - now it's all shiny and new again!

Spoons

I was asked to make a simple spoon for a friends 50th wedding anniversary recently, so I thought I'd make a couple from some pear wood at the same time. The middle one is boxwood; all three are treated with sunflower oil. I didn't try to avoid the knot in the handle of the lower pear piece as I think it adds character, and it might be useful if you wanted to try a bit of string on it...

Etsy

CrossmanCrafts now has an Etsy page! Currently showing pomanders - but more pretty things will follow...