Sunday Christmas Tour Open House

Today the Brass Ring Carousel was open for visitors as part of the Albany Christmas Parlour Tour. No progress has been made on the reindeer, but we took photos of some of the other animals.

Taffy the alpaca's head is in place:


A drawing of King, the lion, is below:


The blocks for King have been assembled and it is in the early stage of carving. One side shows the blocks with very little carving done yet.


Here's a close up of the block side of King's head:



Here's the side of King the lion showing progress on the carving:


Below is Hope, the giraffe, who has had primer coats, and is now getting her spots.


The painting of Kalapuya is coming along.

December 2, 2009 Visit

Mariah and I visited the carving studio after school today. It doesn't look like any work has been done on the reindeer. There are many animals in various stages of caring and painting. We'll post photos of a few of the animals.

The blocks for Sampson the rooster have arrived.

Here's the drawing of Sampson:


Below is the armored horse named Sir Adrian Chapman:


and a close up view showing some details:


Here is the drawing of Sir Adrian Chapman:


There's a unicorn named Marcy in progress:


and a black buck antelope whose native territory is India. This carousel black buck is named Taz. The sponsor for Taz raises black buck antelope in Albany so there are lots of live models for the carver to view the animal's anatomy.

Here's a close up of carving details on Taz:


Taffy the alpaca's carved head was shown on our summer visit blog. Here's the drawing of the alpaca:


and here's a detail shot of the roses in progress:



The little lamb that will stand with Peace the Lioness is sporting a muffler now that it's winter. The lamb in an earlier stage of carving was also shown on our summer visit blog.


Daisy, the little elephant was shown on November 18 without her head. Here she is with her head in place.


Below is a close up of Daisy's head.



Here's a photo of the painting progress on a line up of animals in the painting area:

Mid November Visit

Mariah and I stopped into the studio again after school. A little more progress has been made - a reindeer leg is taking shape!

Here's a photo of the cart for our reindeer, with the body and neck on top shelf, and the legs on lower shelf:



It's always fun to take a ride on the newly completed animals!


All sorts of decorate carvings are being completed.




Seeing this mirrored panel, below, on display at the studio helps us visualize how beautiful the carousel will be.

Early November Visit

The studio is open on Wednesday afternoons. Our grand daughter, Mariah, and I have begun to visit the studio after school on Wednesdays. Today we saw that some progress had been made on our reindeer.

In this photo, the neck is in the foreground and the body is laying on its side. You can see the contour of the haunches taking shape.

Seen from the rear, looking toward the neck, you can see another view of the contour of the haunches.


Turning the reindeer over to see the other side of the reindeer, the block is in place to form the back haunch



and the front haunch is farther along in the contouring process:



Here's the progress on Daisy the little elephant:


A griffin named Sir Hugo Page is taking shape:


Here's the drawing of what Sir Hugo page will look like:



Here's one of the ponies being carved:

A close up shows the detail on the pony's head. There's an awesome braid in the pony's mane.


We checked out the painting progress on one of the horses, named Kalapuya:

The Dentzel Carousel Mechanism

The mechanism for the carousel was donated by the Dentzel family, one of the great names in carousels. The mechanism and center post came from a carousel at Point Pleasant, New Jersey, built in 1909, so 2009 is its one hundredth anniversary.
The gears are made of wood. New gears were fabricated to match the original ones.



The platform is huge. The floor measures 49 feet in diameter. It needed to be rebuilt. New wood was found and purchased in Portland.





The wood on the original apron that finishes the front face of the platform was curved (bent to contour to match the curve of the platform's edge). For the rebuilt platform, wood was cut to shape to follow the curve of the platform. The front piece is standing on the flat edge that attaches to the platform in the photo, with the curved apron edge facing upward.



The center pole is made from a huge tree. The original pole is in great condition and will be used for the new structure. It looks like a mast from an old sailing ship. The finished structure will be 51 feet in height.

The plans shown below are fun to see.

Summer 2009 Visit to the Brass Ring Carousel Studio

The block for the body of a new animal arrived at the studio. This is the beginning stage for all the carved animals.


The progress on our reindeer is slow.


The body is developing some shape. The leg blocks are resting on the lower shelf.


We'll show some photos of other animals in progress below.




The horse below, Kiwi, awaits the first coat of primer.

The baby lamb who will be placed with the Lioness on the carousel is in progress near Taffy the alpaca's head:

The strawberries on the horse below look so real you can almost eat them!


The painting area of the studio is always an exciting place to visit. Each animal gets many coats of paint, beginning with primer. The details come to life even more vividly with the artists' amazing expertise. The cayuse pony, Kalapuya is shown below.


Painting progress on two other horses, Sassie Mae and Lightning are shown below.