Steampunks: The Wedding

I was so honored to have been chosen to create decorative elements for a steampunk wedding and this weekend, the wedding day finally arrived!  The event took place at the fabulous Marvimon House in Los Angeles, a gorgeous mix of raw brick, velvet drapes, succulent living walls, vintage lighting, and a gorgeous sunny courtyard.

We had all manner of inventive gadgetry and mechanical mayhem, starting with blueprint wedding programs, all rolled and presented in a pile of vintage suitcases.

Long dark wood trestle tables were set with simple china and linens, and each place setting featured vintage library cards embellished with brass or copper gears and a be-ribboned brass key.

Photo credit: Narinder Walia

Lit by mercury glass candle-holders and hidden LED lights, centerpieces included the popular ray gun, emblazoned with a banner reading "Stop... in the name of love!"....

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..."Passing Time with Rosie the Robot," completely assembled from the workings of several vintage clocks,

... "Night View Porthole,"  complete with test tube and Edison bulbs,

... "Butterfly Under Glass," an intricate papercut fantasy butterfly perched on a bed of moss under a glass and copper dome, 

 ... and "Literary Garden of Eden," carved from an old Benjamin Disraeli biography, featuring Adam, Eve, and the Tree of Life.

Other elements included these custom silhouettes of the happy couple...

 

... this photoshopped piece of "Victorian-ish" photography.

And for all you "Dune" fans, the very original and creative wedding couple ordered the most "interesting" cake I've ever seen --- the Sandworm --- spicy carrot cake with cream cheese filling.  I just had to share this with you!

Now it's time to enjoy the party!

Photo credit: Narinder Walia

I Love Silhouettes

Silhouettes made from cut paper are so beautiful and delicate, but can be very time-consuming to cut by hand.  I made these vintage-style silhouettes with Adobe Illustrator from photos provided by my clients.  On Illustrator, I can try out different hair styles, like the Gibson Girl updo shown above, and customize clothing details.  Switching out the backgrounds to test out the final look is also a cinch.

The final versions of these will be printed on pages from books, vintage street maps, and tonic labels.

Arrangement in Steampunk #4: Gearing Up for Robots

Steampunk robot assembly in progress last night... I felt like a kid with a new toy!  After taking apart a number of old clocks, I've managed to collect a very nice variety of antique brass gears and guts.  Channeling my inner Frankenstein, matching this gear with that chain, and mixing this screw with that nut, I ended up with... Lola... at least that's what I'm calling her for now.

The final assembly will include a nod to her clock ancestry, lit by test tube lights on a decoupaged tray.

Assembled from clock gears, chains and the actual pendulum.

Arrangement in Steampunk #2

Remember those wooden jewelry boxes lined in velveteen with a little drawer for bracelets and slots for your rings?  I found one the other day and transformed it into another steampunk-inspired mixed media piece, complete with test tube lighting, gears, and copper coils.

Blue-tinted test tube light illuminates the compartment.

The cover, pre-patina

With fixtures from the plumbing aisles, a test tube, moss, refrigeration tubing, and patina solution, it's a centerpiece and a lighting fixture at the same time.   A far cry from it's original state:

Arrangement in Steampunk #1

Assembly has finally begun on the steampunk centerpieces... hoorah!  This first arrangement is just dipping a toe into the whole steampunk aesthetic, in keeping with the clients' love of books, sci-fi, oddities, and gadgetry.  The remaining arrangements will go deeper, I promise.

A tiny carved cork pavilion atop a bed of moss and anchored by crepe myrtle branches sits esconced in its copper and rivet dome.  Tattered volumes sit on a tray made from the back panel of a London County Council clock, embellished with some gears and trimmed with the clock's chain.

An alligator claw atop a copper plumbing fixture adds a touch of the unexpected.  For height, pthalo blue-painted pear branches adorned with paper leaves (cut from pages of the Disraeli biography) is anchored to the tray with copper pipe fittings.

Detail of pear branches with paper leaves

Top view

Before and After: Disraeli in Love

In the bottom of the book bin at the cavernous St. Vincent de Paul thrift store in downtown, I uncovered a wonderful selection of overlooked works of literature --- the libretto of The Pirates of Penzance, a biography on Benjamin Disraeli, and a history of the Harvey Girls.  Sadly, the covers were falling off, and the spines were broken, but I rescued them anyway, destined to be altered into artpieces which will serve as a centerpiece for a wedding.

From the forgotten book bin.

Expanding on the theme of love (it's for a wedding after all), I slipped a fresh blade into my Olfa knife and started hacking away at the pages, carving away layer after layer.  A few smudges of charcoal and some additional finessing with scissors, and...

"Disraeli in Love," paper and charcoal, Lea Antonio, 2012.

A quiet forest,

A starless night perfect for

lovers' midnight tryst.

Before and After: Vintage Copper

In order to artfully display a few small scale carved pieces for the upcoming Steampunk Wedding, I thought glass bell jars or cloches would be the perfect solution.  They are pretty easy to find at thrift stores and, if worse comes to worse, you can always turn a glass bowl upside-down.  Here are a few of the glass objects I scored for a few dollars at St. Vincent de Paul in downtown LA.

A wooden cheese plate with glass cover, upturned bowl of floor-standing candle holder, and an old liqueur bottle (there was even a little bit of liqueur left in the bottle!).

After applying some weld lines and rivets to the wooden cheese plate, I painted on some iron paint and applied a rusting solution.  While I waited for the rust to develop, I applied a copper band to the rim and the handle of the glass cover, and dripped on some patina solution.  After a few hours of (very impatient) waiting time, this is what I ended up with!

Rust plated covered dish.

Next up, the glass bowl which originally sat in an iron stand, now discarded.  I upturned the bowl and turned it into a dome.  Using puffy paint (yes, the kind that comes in squeeze bottles) I dotted the lip of the dome with large dots (faux rivets) and applied copper to the whole lip.  A little patina solution and I have a display dome suitable for Capt. Nemo's parlor.

Steampunk Bits and Bobs

To be perfectly honest, up until a few months ago, steampunk as an aesthetic was completely off my radar.  But in recent months, with an important project in the works, I've immersed myself in a world filled with the perfection of gears and cogs, the smell of old books, the patina of aged copper, the buzz of Edison bulbs, and the exuberance of outlandish gadgetry.

I'm lucky to have been chosen to create a series of portable art-pieces to adorn tables at an upcoming steampunky sci-fi wedding.  To call them centerpieces would be inaccurate... rather they are mini homages to the happy couple's love of books, science fiction, and technology, with a Jules Verne twist.

First things first, you have to collect the materials, which is no easy task when miniature copper steam engines and Victorian objet d'artes are on the list.  Instead, I've collected bits and bobs, odds and ends, and as many old things that Aidan (my son) and I can take apart.

Here are a few of the things I've got in my growing stash parts, ready to be altered, painted, riveted, and transformed into steampunk heaven.  And, yes, those are preserved alligator claws.

An old specimen caddy.

Some kinda clip-on magnifier... clip on to what?

Alligator claws.

Glass elements.

Pre-tarnished candelabra.

An ancient and futuristic iron.

From the plumbing department.

Looks rather robotic to me.

Some kinda clamp.

I call them alien seed pods.

Brass clock gears.