Moulds, materials and more ideas

Yesterday, on a day of dark grey skies and almost constant rain, I train hopped out to the oddly named village of Theydon Bois, just outside Epping. Nice old place - been around at least a half dozen centuries. On the site of a former dairy farm, surrounded by amazing panoramic countryside views, sits London Mould Makers, with barns full of strangely cladded shapes, assorted pieces of machinery, shelves of coloured or textured resins and Jesmonite, and a fire in a metal barrel to keep out the damp chill.

This is where sculptors and assorted customers come to have work cast, from the very small to the very large. One of their recent works was the construction and installation of a 4.5m golden cockerel at Tottenham Hotspur Football Club’s new stadium (@LDNMouldMakers).

I was picked up from the station by Arthur, who previously worked at Arch Bronze in Putney before setting up his own space. I’d brought a couple of pieces and a dozen questions about casting materials, mould making, timeframes and costing. I did say I was taking action didn’t I? This is advance planning but still reckon it’s valuable to do now rather than later.

Anyhow, it was extremely informative; I’d done some reading on the subject but until you can hold samples in your hand and see how something looks and feel its heft, then it’s hard to know what you’re dealing with. Those amazing glowing spheres you can see on the website are resin coloured with translucent pigment. Wow, they look amazing but when I handled an opaque resin piece it really looked plasticy and not too appealing. A Jesmonite arm section however (a composite material which can be made to look like pretty much anything) looked and felt like stone but it can be beautifully smooth or textured depending on what you are casting from, and happily for me, can be pre-tinted with bright colours or cast in plain white then painted. Think this is what I’d want to be using, though now I'm having a whole bunch of new ideas forming for this and bas relief pieces to hang on walls.

The surprise for me was 3D scanning. Some articles I'd read indicated that it was a more cost effective and efficient way of creating maquettes to mould from, but an estimate from Arthur for my mid-size piece was more expensive than the traditional method of making a mould and 3D printing would add even more cost and possibly extra work depending on the printer quality.

So, all in all, a useful visit and much thanks to Arthur for his time and expertise here. I have more plans now...

Image above courtesy of Wix.