Wedding bells

Stef spends most of his days in a pair of jeans, a t-shirt, an old glue covered apron and generally covered dust. He scrubbed up nicely though this past weekend when he went and got himself married. Big congratulations to him and his new wife, Jemima. Here's to a happy life together!!

Stretcher Making in the Late Sessions

So last night a capacity crowd gathered in the arena that is the Wood Workshop to watch, listen and learn about how to make a stretcher frame and apply a canvas. This session led by Phil was designed, once again, to get the students hands on and interactive with both materials and tools. By the end of the evening each of the students left with their very own canvas ready to go paint. Below are some images taken from the evening.

Phil starts the evening by looking at some examples of stretcher frames. 

Having just got going we all had to go cool down outside as the fire alarm went off!

In the Cutting room to hear about what materials to order.

Phil starts his frame having cut and bevelled the edge. Corner clamps required for this bit. 

With the frame assembled in the clamps the corners are pre drilled ready for screwing. 

First one side, then the other of each corner.

We then gave each student their own frame parts and let them have a go at assembling. 

Too many cooks? Not in this case. Great team work from these three  

The assembly room in full flow as the students got to grips making their frames. 

Next Phil sands down the edges in preparation for the canvas. 

The canvas is laid out upside down. Note the canvas has been cut to allow enough to be pulled up and round onto the back edge. 

Phil starts to staple sections of the canvas. His technique is to start in the middle of each length and work out to the corners.

Next he works on his perfect corners through a series of small pleats and tucks. 

Finally the students got to add the canvas to their earlier made frames. 

Great evening! 

The Late sessions, Part 2 and other things

The past week has seen a steady flow of students from many differing courses down making with us. The second of the late sessions went well with an increase on numbers from the previous week. This time around we focused on fixed machinery and the students, most of whom had little or no experience with these types of machines, then enjoyed the making session at the end. Below are some images taken last night and form the previous week.

The group listen in as Phil explains some of our fixed machinery  

At the end of the evening the students got to pin onto a board the shapes that had been made. 

 

Some delicate line bending taking place. 

All smile as parts of this small contraption are fitted.

Alex working on his latest creation. He spends a lot of time with us. Funny, his surname is Wood!

Some really accurate pillar drilling on show here. 

On the Fret Saw this old book cover is being transformed.

Measuring up the canvas ready to stretch around the frames.. 

Very interesting hinged furniture prototype in the making here.

 Van from MA ISD taking on her own hinged piece of work.

Glueing up some frames, as per the drawing. 

Aixin from BA Fine Art says, if you can make one large canvas then you might as well make three! 

BA Fine Art 2nd year, Momei certainly has the X factor here. 

Fine Art student William gets to grips with his shape.

Vanessa Hodgkinson

A very nice little exhibition popped up just opposite the Wood Workshop the other day by a regular student in with us, Vanessa Hodgkinson. Here is what she says about her work.

"The Work is about the relationship between painting and digital reproduction. The paintings themselves originate from the patterns used on printer test sheets for home printers. Once complete, the cycle of paintings each one representing C,M,Y & K (black) are photographed and reduced to A4. This  image is then printed over and over hundreds of times during the show, until al the ink fades."

The Late Sessions. Part 1

So last night, with the lights turned on, we began our series of evening sessions. For the students of BA Fine Art, the aim is to provide these budding artists with some skills, knowledge and confidence to come and work with us in the Wood Workshop in a more self sufficient way. A very lovely first group joined us and following some chat from us, were given the chance to get hands with the hand tools we had just demonstrated to them. Hope to see you all next week. Below are some images from the session.

Phil talks all things Jigsaw with the group 

Its time to get hands on with the Cordless drill 

Getting the hang of a Jigsaw is a very rewarding experience. 

We produced a number of shapes from different materials to give the students a chance to fix them in any way they can

All smiles as a simple little structure takes shape 

Stef concentrates hard on perfect corners.

 But always keeps the mood light.

And when the lights go down the little objects come to life!