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Anyone who knows me, knows that my other passion, apart from knobs that is, is my boat. I have a Sparkman and Stephens design 37 foot sail boat, classed as a classic yacht by some but an old wooden boat … Continue reading
Just back from a lightning visit to Buenos Aires for a visit to Fersa.- 5 days. You’ve probably heard it before, Buenos Aires,- Paris in South America. It has been a mecca for architectural salvage. No kidding!
Salvage architectural wrought iron
I needed to update myself with a supplier that has become very important to us. This is only my second visit, the first soon after we became their Australian representatives.
By staying in touch, visiting, I believe we create a better understanding of their processes which means we can be a better representative. Also of course, find out what is new.
I enjoy touring the factory and picking up on new detail. There is something fascinating about a place that takes in raw product and turns out finished product and observing atmosphere. I’m particularly interested in how the workers go about their tasks. Are they involved? are the conditions good? At Fersa, all great.
Beyond novelty, this is sculptural hardware meets jewellery
I’ve been to most of my suppliers places and have a pretty good understanding of casting and finishing hardware, the most common processes being sand casting and forging, but Fersa is the first factory I’ve dealt with that performs lost wax or investment casting.
Basically sand casting is fine for 2 dimensional casting and delivers a result thats fine for most hardware, but with lost wax, detail reproduction is excellent.
Fersa have a master pattern maker, one who hand produces what is needed in resin from which a rubber mould is made. Softened wax is injected into the mould and when
released, a wax replica of the item is made. The processes is repeated until there are enough pieces to make up a ‘tree’ that can be used for the casting.
The tree is placed in a cylinder and loaded with a gypsum that is vibrated so that flow into all the crevices is achieved. Drainage holes are made when set and then a series of ovens, first bakes and hardens the gypsum, then melts the wax. Molten brass is poured into the cavity and you have the raw product.
Now, while I can say all this in two sentences, (more or less) this is very skilled and time consuming and this might help explain why Fersa products are what they are, Truly fabulous! All this of course before expert engraving, chasing, machining and finishing.
Link to Fersa production information http://www.fersa.biz/en/company/custom-hardware/
Armand Albert Rateau
I first came across this designer through Fersa. When I saw their range in the Buenos Aires showroom, I loved it. Even though I loved it, I wasn’t brave enough to order samples for the shop, though I eventually did and they’re there to be seen. We are currently processing and order for a local high profile architects’ own home.
Never heard of Rateau? Ok, neither had I, so when I found out that a chair of his, an original, sold for US$970.000 achieving the highest price recorded for a 20th century chair, I felt a little ignorant. Worse still, Christies New York achieved a price of $13.750 for, wait for it, a pair of lever handles, the likes of which, Fersa produce an exceptional quality reproduction that I can sell for around $900.00, including GST!
Header image is detail of hinge.
Here are some links I have enjoyed.
http://www.bookofjoe.com/2004/09/armand_albert_r.html
http://www.christies.com/LotFinder/lot_details.aspx?intObjectID=5392415
My name’s Carl and I started Mother of Pearl & Sons Trading back around 1974 and it’s still going strong. How did it start?
Melbourne shop at 361 bridge road Richmond
I fell into running/owning an ‘antique’ store on Oxford street Paddington called Jack O’Beans, inherited the name. Started experimenting, making a furniture polish for finishing kauri pine pieces after stripping. Those were the years of waxed pine.
It was big along the Kings Road in London in those days, and it was a great look. Still is.
So anyway, finally, I came up with the formula that worked for me: beeswax, natural gum turps and a dash of linseed oil and eventually decided that the road to riches was down the path of what was to become Natural Beeswax Furniture Polish!
Shop/showroom PYD Building, 197 Young street Waterloo
Sales showed some promise. Enough to turn thoughts to creating a business around supplying restoration products through the antique trade.
So I sold up the lease on the shop, conjured up the name Mother of Pearl & Sons Trading and went off to Calcutta – as it was called back then – with about a dozen original handles from Victorian and Edwardian furniture.
I think it was around this time that I developed a particular philosophy that I still use. It’s called the disconnect between expectation and reality.
Of course I expected to be a great success. I would have the handles reproduced and cast in brass and there would be this enormous demand. Sure.
Well, to be fair there was a demand and the thread from those days to today is there because I still sell knobs and handles The journey has not always been easy, a minor understatement, but it has been interesting and ultimately fascinating and rewarding.
Melbourne display
Today I’m pretty happy with where we’re at with Mother of Pearl & Sons. Sydney shop is vibrant and busy, the new Melbourne shop everything I could have hoped for, the current team in both shops are excellent and importantly the product ranges are world class.