Making a door handle black - patination versus powder coating

Alloys like steel and bronze can be colored by immersion in a chemical patina such as the M20 chemical from Birchwood which is suitable for bronze or by baking on a layer of pigment powder to the surface of the handle. Neither method is superior to the other, but both have different benefits.

316 Stainless steel is better suited to powder coating as this type of steel is hard, dense and corrosion resistant making it difficult for chemicals to penetrate or to form a chemical bond with. Our Morphic and Ergo collections are typically cast in 316 stainless steel an alloy that lends itself to contemporary door handle designs.
Copper is the primary metal in bronze, and it will readily react and oxidize when exposed to acidic chemicals to form a new micro thin layer. The color that develops through this conversion of copper will depend on the chemicals used and the colors can range from blue greens to red browns to black.  To create black, we use M20 a product made by Birchwood Technologies and one that contains selenious acid which is the component that oxidizes the copper turning it brown or black depending on the number of applications and length of each treatment. As the depth of color can be built up over several immersions it is method well suited to a patina where you want a range of color and a more organic appearance. As the patina is micro-thin several layers can be built up and then sanded back to reveal a range of color. If a uniform effect is wanted then the handle can be immersed in a bath of this solution several times to develop an even color of the required darkness.

By comparison powder coating works well on 316 stainless steel as the pigmented layer is baked on to the surface of the piece and no penetration of the surface occurs. Powder coating offers a wider and more controllable range of color and luster with a wide range of standard colors and custom mixes available from companies like Prismatic who offer a choice of over 6,000 colors. https://www.prismaticpowders.com

Hoodoos of Bryce Canyon an Illustration of Nature's Design Influence - part 2

Hoodoos of Bryce Canyon an illustration of the design influence of Nature – part 2

Following on from last weeks post our journey continued from the Grand Canyon in Arizona through Zion and ended with the surreal landscapes of Bryce Canyon. Over the years we had glimpsed on-line photos of the Hoodoos, but these did not prepare us for the spectacle of Bryce Canyon. It is an other-world experience mysterious and magical and like none we have ever encountered. The word Hoodoo derives from the word voodoo and denotes something that is ill-fated or will bring bad luck which would be the case if one were foolish enough to climb one of these fragile dangerous spires.

photo by Martin Pierce

These fairy chimneys develop over millions of years as the softer inner core of sandstone and mud are eroded by water that freezes and expands creating cracks and holes that are precariously held together by the harder layers of sandstone and limestone*. Bryce Canyon experiences many cycles of extreme heat and cold, moisture and aridity and these dramatic variations cause the softer stone to erode and dissolve leaving behind a collection of fragile spires. The process is ongoing, and these precarious rocks continue to collapse and fall and rumor has it can be heard doing so after dusk has set.

Photo by Martin Pierce

Our on-line and fleeting view of  hoodoos did not directly inspire the but there holy skeletal shapes certainly remind us of the hoodoos of Bryce canyon.

Source of geology notes :

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hoodoo_(geology)

Small Wine Closet Big Statement

Investing in wine is a serious venture and one that works best for those able to exercise self-control in the interest of deferred gratification.

Once the long-term commitment to wine collecting has been made the connoisseur then has to plan how to house the collection and this is where the creative challenge begins. When I think of wine collections I tend to think of lofty cellars deep in the basements of grand chateaus or perhaps grandiose Sonoma wineries and indeed our grapevine collection fits well in either setting. What I am less likely to think of is the modest interior of a hallway closet.

I recently had the pleasure of meeting Faye Montgomery, a Los Angeles homeowner who was in the process of renovating a home that she and her husband had bought in West Los Angeles. When I first heard that Faye was creating a wine closet, I instinctively thought of our smaller scale vine door handle which at a more modest height of 14” works well for smaller wine rooms. However, on looking at the 30” x 80” glass door I understood why Faye was leaning toward the Ergo extended door pull a dramatic 3’ tall contemporary door grip. While the Ergo handle may not be an obvious choice, I think it is clear from the photos that this 2-toned sculptural piece works beautifully with the ceramic wall tiles that mimic hexagonal metal studs and a ceramic floor that looks like weathered walnut. Although the wine closet is small the sleek handle appears to be floating and in so doing does not over-power the wine collection which also appears air born. Taken together the 3-dimensional tiles, the angled ceramic floor and the handle create a clever illusion of timeless space.

Photo Courtesy of Faye Montgomery

Tiles from Spain available through Emser Tile, West Hollywood.

Morphic Door Handles - The etymology of Morphic

We are often asked about the etymology of certain words that have been used to name our different door hardware collections and this is especially true of our “Morphic” series. Some of our hardware collections were named early on in their development with names borrowed from a complimentary furniture collection. Such is the history of “Hedgerow” used to describe our furniture as well as our hardware collections with both being named for the man-made hedges of western England.

By contrast the Morphic collection derived its name through an amalgam of different words that included “Morpheus” “Morphing” and “Anthropomorphic”. By synthesizing these words, we stumbled upon “Morphic” a word that is short and easy to pronounce though perhaps not as well suited to describe this collection as the definitions below make clear;

Anthropomorphic – attributing human characteristics to non-humans, a habit we plead guilty to when talking about our beloved Pitbull Iris

Morpheus – God of dreams or sleep would have been a very fitting name as the collection certainly has an unearthly dream like quality and the name would appeal to fans of the Matrix franchise (see accreditation)

Morphing – this term comes from the animation industry and describes how one image can be changed by small steps to smoothly create another image and while this would have been a good choice, we needed a noun and not a verb to name our collection (accreditation below).

Morphic – meaning a specific shape or form

The Morphic collection is an ongoing series whose shapes and form we are constantly stretching and changing so that it’s fretted cells can be made to work for larger door handles and for different hardware and lighting applications. It is also a style that takes on a different character when it is cast in bronze and finished with a charred patina. The charred appearance is created by applying the chemical patina M20 made by Birchwood Technologies over a satin brushed bronze surface and by burnishing the surrounding surface to create depth.

Accreditation;

Definition of morphing: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morphing

Morpheus fictional character in The Matrix franchise: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morpheus_(The_Matrix)

Chemical Patina M20 by Birchwood Technologies distributed by Sculpt Nouveau

https://sculptnouveau.com/collections/birchwood-patinas

Are Contemporary Door Handles also Modern Door Handles - untangling semantics

Being a product of the 50’s and later being influenced by the 1960’s mod culture I have often used the adjectives modern and contemporary interchangeably and see that many search engines also assume these terms are synonymous.

More Modern Door Pulls

Various dictionaries define contemporary as meaning to live or be from the same time so clearly the word can be used to describe past periods as in “Gaudi and Mackintosh were contemporary architects”. By comparison the word modern is defined as being in the present or in recent times and does not have the historical breadth as the word contemporary. That said, social trends and common usage may have the biggest impact on a word’s meaning and while the word modern was, in the 1960’s understood to mean to fashionable or hip, the word now seems a little dated. Lately I find myself describing my Martin’s designs as futuristic which is not surprising given his fondness for sci-fi. So, when you look at these pictures of our work use whatever term you think fits!”

Modern Door Knob part of the Morphic Collection

The Morphic serpentine door pulls when cast in stainless steel do appear a little alien and while the first film in the alien series is one that Martin has seen countless times the lead alien was not a model for this pull.

Ergo Door Lever an interior lever set in stainless steel

Perhaps the offspring of the alien may have had a more direct impact on the Morphic door knob.

Thankfully the more “modern” Ergo lever has it’s roots in the art nouveau period.