More and more Mokume
Ya’ll know by now that I adore the Mokume Gane. What *I* didn’t know is that there are patterns other than the standard woodgrain! I was reviewing sites by jewelry designers that work with the metal and found out that there is more than one way to mokume. Just look at these gorgeous patterns from Andura Designs:
The wave is pretty neat but I can’t get over the raindrop pattern. How cool is that? I do wish there was more info on the techniques used to make patterns like that, but it may be an industry secret kind of thing. Here’s a closer look:
The patterning is no big secret, though to get a really in depth explination on the patterns generally you have to look at info on decorative “pattern welding” (similar process but using different grades of steel instead of different precious metals).
I’ve also seen people do similar things with fimo clay.
The most impressive I’ve seen was a repeating design of *bees* (!) on a pattern welded blade that won a knife making contest in a magazine my brother (the blacksmith) gets.
The raindrop really caught my eye, too! I love it.
Thanks for the info, sterlingspider! I have to admit that even after reading sites that explain the technique, I’m still confuzzled about how the patterns come about. Check this out!
That’s a pretty good example of what can be done but not a great explination. This has some OK explinations but incredible examples
http://www.dfoggknives.com/copy_of_index/damascus.htm
For the raindrop pattern… Imagine you made a dessert, say fudge, with multiple thin layers of different colored flavors. As your fudge layers are setting you take something like a tapered chopstick and press it straight down into the desert through all the layers all over the pan, then you compress the whole thing somehow so the holes squish closed. If you sliced horizontally through the middle of the right layer you’d probably get something very similar to the raindrop design.
That’s a really simple example, some of these patterns involve very priecise stacking and twisting and folding, and all sorts of manipulation, but if you imagine taking that same slab of layered fudge and manipulating it different ways and then slicing through it, you may get some idea of how these patterns come about.