Founded in 1988 in Ooltewah, Tennessee, Richards Fowkes & Company has been hand-building incredible pipe organs for churches and universities around the country. Founders Bruce Fowkes and Ralph Richards have brought together a group of talented American and European craftsmen to build these ambitious organs in the traditional manner and methods of historic northern European instruments.
Although all of the casework is hand built and hand carved from wood, the over 60 ornate carved finials that embellish the casework are made from Townsend Casting Resin. First, several master prototype finials were hand carved from oak. Then, Knead-a-Mold (the light blue material shown) was applied onto the carved finials so that an exact replica could be made. Because Knead-a-Mold picks up very minute detail, the texture and grain of the wood was captured beautifully in the mold. Once the mold was made, Townsend Casting Resin was poured into the mold and allowed to cure. The resin cured to a bright white color and was then post finished with a variety of dyes and paints that matched the natural golden brown color of the oak.

Photos show some of the completed cast resin finials incorporated onto oak framework.
The finished pipe organ is 27′ tall, has 30 stops, and approximately 1700 pipes. The largest pipe is 16′ tall and the smallest is 1 1/2″ long and the diameter of a soda straw.

To learn more about Richards Fowkes & Co and to see more of their work, visit www.richardsfowkes.com
Click here to see Townsend Atelier products.

Victor uses a wide variety of processes and materials in his work including Knead-a-Mold. He says, “Knead a mold is a very easy to use, versatile product which has been very useful in making quick molds. It is especially useful in molding bas-reliefs, and small sculptures for wax and plaster reproduction.”

Monument to Firefighters in clay Detail

Monument to Firefighters, bronze/installation in Lawrence, KS

Old Man, clay

Sequoya, life-sized, clay

To see more of Benjamin Victor’s work, visit www.benjaminvictor.com

These yummy Oreo pendants were made by making a mold with Knead-a-Mold onto a real cookie and then pressing white earthenware clay into the cured mold. The fired earthenware cookies were carefully painted with brown glazesand then varnished.

This starfish pendant was made with white earthenware clay pressed into a mold made from a real starfish with Knead-a-Mold. The starfish is glazed in a lovely, soft orange which was partially wiped away to reveal the beautiful texture of the starfish. It was then glazed in a clear gloss glaze, affixed to a sterling silver bail and hung from a black elastic cord. “I grew up on the coast of Maine and am missing the ocean living here in Atlanta, and so i have started making some pieces that remind me of my salty roots!”

The pendants and earrings below are made from white stoneware clay that were pressed into a Knead-a-Mold mold that were taken from vintage cabochons and other interesting objects.

To view more of Charity’s work visit:
www.charityelise.com
www.charityelise.etsy.com
To view all of Townsend Atelier products click here

Our new Web Gallery will be a place where we will regularly showcase some of the incredible work that our customers are creating with our products. We are always excited to see what everyone is making and hope that you will be too. Please check our site periodically for new postings.

You may get some inspiration. What will you make?

P.S. We would love for you to tell us what you are making! Send us an email and let us know!

Leslie Molen is a nationally recognized doll artist based in Denver, CO. She has exhibited her one-of-a-kind work in galleries and museums around the world.

Little Blossoms in Red, and Little Blossoms in Lavender, by Leslie Molen. Mold of original clay head with Knead-a-Mold, silicone putty. The “Heads in a row” show from original, molded, and the finished product.

To make the finely detailed heads of her intricate elves, she pours the heads in Clay-Shay (available at AVES) which she covers with cloth. Leslie then makes a mold of the cloth covered clay head with Knead-a-Mold.“I appreciate that the Knead-a- Mold picks up such fine detail that I can still cover the head in fabric and that detail still shows through!” she says.

For more information about Leslie and her work, visit www.rootie.com
To view all of Townsend Atelier products, click here

Becky Stern, one of their regular contributors recently posted a Podcast on resin casting using Knead-a-Mold, our safe and easy to use molding silicone.  The project is a great place to start to learn how to do a very simple mold before you venture out into more complicated territory.

For more information about Knead-a-Mold, read our past gallery/news posts or visit the How To section on our website.  Questions?  Feel free to email us:  info@townsendatelier.com

SMALL CONCRETE CASTING by Andrew Goss | 2009
I’ve recently completed a short series of wall-mounted pins (brooches), playing on the idea that things–jewelery objects in particular–really change when the material changes, even if the form is identical. It’s interesting to compare the value we place on precious metals compared to more utilitarian materials. The sets of three pins are based on one original pod-like form made from fusing silver sheet and wire. This is a technique where you are working with the silver in it’s “slush phase”, the red-heat temperature range where the silver is above a solid, but below a liquid. You can fuse pieces of silver together, scrape texture into the surface, break pieces off, melt wire into the surface. After immersing in acid to remove oxides, the surface is burnished, but a lot of the roughness and spontaneity of the process remains.

The silver pin is the one in the middle. On the left, I used a black-pigmented cement mixed with stone dust and additives. On the right, I used white Portland cement with stone dust and additives, and after it was set I rubbed in a thin slurry of pigmented cement, which was mostly then rubbed off.

After some research I discovered the ideal molding material. It’s a two-part silicone called Knead-a-Mold. (There are other brands as well.) You take equal parts and mix the putty-like substance together with your fingers–it’s completely non-toxic and can even be used for food molds–until the colours are blended completely, then push it against and around the object you want to duplicate. I did this with the silver pin, let it set, then cast plaster around that to give the mold support, then took all the components apart. I mixed up the cement and packed it into the empty silicone mold backed by the plaster. I had previously made pin back assemblies which I embedded into the cement before it set.The concrete pins are identical in every wayto the original silver one, except in the material itself. Every detail of the metal’s fused texture is visible. These two-part non-toxic silicones have amazing potential. I mounted the pins onto a matte white acrylic sheet so they could be placed on a wall when not being worn.

To learn more about Andrew and his work visit his websites:
www.artconcrete.blogspot.com
www.makersgallery.com/concrete