Northfield Newspaper article Wed. Feb. 4th

Our article spot in the local paper! Please click on the picture so you can read it.

Coming along...

Evy and Jess busy at work. Evy cuts away at her breastplate piece while Jess works on pounding more defined domes into hers.

A sneek peek at the direction where Jennifer is taking her armor.

The three of us hope to get far this weekend. This coming Wednesday or Thursday (28th, 29th) out local newspaper (the Northfield News) is going to come out to the studio and take pictures and write a story for the Saturday Jan. 31st paper!

Brainstorming

What is defense? What does it mean to clad yourself in armor? Certainly armor can take many forms, both literal and metaphorical. Following is a rough list of all the different meanings defense can branch off into.

- offense vs. defense
- protection --> armor --> shell
- violence --> weapons --> money --> tools --> biology
- knowledge --> teachers --> strategy --> bravery --> hiding --> fear
- community --> family --> bodyguards --> army
- spells --> magic
- camera --> evidence --> witness
- deceit --> misdirection --> subterfuge --> camouflage
- symbols --> uniforms
- mentality --> confidence --> intimidation

As this list builds, it soon becomes apparent that the categories begin to link and overlap.

After marking an outline of her breastplate on the steel, Jess uses a rottery cutter (basically a overgrown can opener) to cut the shape out. Next step is to take it to the English Wheel!

A few goes with the English Wheel and breasts are beginning to form! However, the edges are sharp from the rottery cutter! Here, Jess is working on cutting tabs around the outside edges of her breastplate. The tabs with then be bent backward to the inside of the armor so that the edges are no longer sharp.

Jess modeling her forming breastplate for the camera! I think it looks rather convincing so far!

A collection of various keys. How do keys relate to armor and defense? More often than not, they can represent hiding something cherished or the keeping of secrets.

All togehter and ready to test!

The English Wheel is complete and whole!
Huzzah!

The wheel is done! Now it's time to test it!

The English Wheel is used to manipulate the steel to dome and create the illusion of the breasts for the armor. As the steel is pushed and pulled between the top and bottom wheels, the steel expands and becomes thinner. Since only a selected portion of the steel is being effected, the steel is forced upward instead of outward.

Testing the effects of annealing on a piece of chrome plated steel (upper left) and galvanized steel (lower right). Annealing is when you heat up steel and cool is quickly by dunking it in water (or in our case, tossed in a pile of snow). Doing this makes the steel softer, less brittle, and overall, easier to manipulate. As for the test pieces in the photo, the once shiny chrome steel turned a bluish green color and the galvanized steel lost it's reflectiveness and most of its visual texture.

A photo of Jess and the chain she spent two hours on freeing it from the contraption is used to be attached to (lower right). I think it used to be apart of a mass sorting device in a postoffice.

Getting started...

One of the two steel breadboxes still together.

Using the cutter seen in the photo, the breadboxes are dismantled.

Evy at work cutting up her breadbox.

Finally, it's all cut apart!

A snap shot of the design plans for the English Wheel.

A loose assembly of the English Wheel to come.

Jess at the grinding wheel, prepping pieces to be welded. Grinding the edges down gets rid of any dirty coating and roughs them up to make welding more effective.

Evy sets up the torch to begin the welding process.

Evy at work welding some of the pieces together.

Our Project's Mission

Just as the title implies, we're turning old, chrome bread boxes into women's breast plates. We are three. The medium is metal. Our work is strong.

Task one: build the machine.
The English Wheel is a machine designed to bend metal compressing one sheet of metal and raising it. This we will cut, grind, and weld together.

We plan to use the bread boxes as the base of the breast plates, and decorate these with steel wire and sheets.

Looking at historical examples and drawing from our own inspiration, these breast plates will show the woman's form and tell of women warriors of the past.