Recently a customer dropped of a crucifix for some repair work. It was somewhat small for a wood carving, but beautifully carved. It was carved in Europe from Lime wood, something similar to our bass wood. I can’t tell how old it is. The carved Jesus seems old, with a lot of patina, but the cross looks fairly new. This is how it looked when it came to me.
I had a nice piece of wood leftover from a customer job and a couple of free days so I did something I seldom do…I made an eagle for inventory. The blank was an odd size so I decided to enlarge a standard 25″ Bellamy. This eagle is 43″ long by 8″ tall and 5″ deep.
I originally tried using imitation gold leaf as a finish. I’ve never tried it, but it is much cheaper, so I figured I’d give it a try and give my customers another choice of finish that was cheaper than real gold leaf. What a disaster. Imitation gold leaf is much thicker than real gold. It didn’t stick and made a mess of the eagle. My only option was to paint over it. White is the most common color the original eagles are found in, so it is fitting. It is lightly aged and for sale at $750.