ElementFe is my trade name for the Guemes Island blacksmith shop; designing, forging, and building handcrafted forged steel and iron furniture, gates, railings, candlesticks, spoons, kitchenware and all manner of repair and fabrication.

Friday, March 27, 2009


Here's the gate, in kit form.
All the elements but the latch and hinges are in place, the next thing is to work out details of anchor points so that the arch halves can be set in concrete, then I'll be able to take precise measurements for the hinges and latch.

Friday, March 20, 2009







The arch and gates take shape.

Wednesday, March 18, 2009








Next step is to hammer what will be the hook into a long thin point.
Here are the finished blanks marked for trimming- then it's back into the fire to shape the bowl.
When it's nice and hot, it's flexible enough to be sunk into a form, using a round ended hammer, being careful to keep all the edges even.
Then the hook is heated and bent into its final shape, and the spoon is clamped into a vise for cleanup with wire brushes.
Not shown (because it takes two hands) is all the hand hammering to clean up and refine the rough forging that the power hammer does!
And finally, here is a new little family of spoons, resting for a moment on a garden gate arch (next post!)






I thought I'd document the birth of a batch of spoons.
Here, a piece of iron bar is set into the forge. When it's yellow hot, it's hammered on edge under the 25 lb. Little Giant forging hammer, to set off the section that will be the bowl of the spoon, which is then flattened and spread sideways.
The handle is drawn out and then cut to length using a "hardy" on the anvil- basically a knife edge sticking up- the bar is laid on top of the hardy and a few blows with the hammer cut the hot, pliable iron.

Saturday, March 14, 2009


Well, there it is, a finished arch in kit form. Now to lay it out and take measurements for the decorative gates!

Thursday, March 12, 2009







Here are photos of the Chinese arch for the Slabaugh garden gate- you can see how it's made from thin sheet steel, there's a radius that swings from an arm welded to my work table that shows me how to lay out the many pieces to form the right shape, and a few of the finished box beam being prepared for final welding along the seams.

Thursday, March 05, 2009







This wine cabinet is installed at Adrift Cafe in Anacortes- it was damaged during the remodel, and I brought my small wire feed welder to the alley and patched it up. Better than new!

Here also are a few shots of cutting arcs and laying them out for a box beam I'm building for a Chinese inspired (meaning, circular) garden gate.

I'm building the arch in two halves- those will be installed and then final measurements will be taken for gate halves and infill.