The entire process starts with a reference image. You can send us anything, even multiple images if you need multiple angles to get your vision right. Our client Jessica sent us this quick pic she snapped of a treasured ornament her daughter made when she was eight.
When Jessica heard about what Flower & Fang does, she immediately thought of this keepsake that she knew she wanted translated into an heirloom quality hardwood canvas that she can treasure with her family for a lifetime.
Where this fragile ornament may break as the years go on, a Flower & Fang hardwood canvas is nigh-on indestructible and can withstand anything life throws at it: moves, kids, pets, you name it.
Let's talk about how it gets made!
After we receive your reference image, we load it into Illustrator and start designing! Maybe you had very clear instructions about what you want your canvas to look like, certain woods you want used, like Jessica, who knew she wanted the Airstream to be the beautiful blue-grey we get with our black-stained Baltic birch.
Or maybe, similar to Jessica as well, you might be wondering: "how does this exactly translate into a rectangular canvas?" You might want the artist's touch, and that's exactly where we come in.
With Jessica's star-shaped ornament, we imagined it as a camping scene, as if jumping off right where the artist was headed at age eight when she so lovingly designed her ornament.
We then use our library of six tonal hardwoods: maple, cherry, walnut, sapele, aromatic cedar, and black-stained Baltic birch - creating a painting out of hardwood with composition and depth in mind, resulting in a beautiful hardwood tableau.
We send this mockup off to you, the client, for your first of two rounds of revisions. The above was the first one we sent off to Jessica. She loved it immediately, but had a few things to say, which we always hope our clients do, because that's when the art gets more personal.
She reminded us that she really wanted the Airstream in the blue-grey of the black-stained Baltic birch, and wanted the treelines to be less refined and digital and more childlike in line with the rest of the image. Of course, we said, we're on it!
So we made those changes lickety-split and sent the adjusted mockup back to Jessica. There was something about the top of the treeline that seemed too pointy and awkward, it was sticking out to her, she was staring at it too much, and she didn't want to have to live with it forever. Easy enough, off it came, smoothed out no problem.
We sent the final off to Jessica after the two rounds of revisions to let her know we were firing up the lasers and off to cut her piece.
This is where the fun part really begins, well, for us anyway, because it involves some hyper-modern, hyper-cool power tools. Our CO2 lasers direct a beam of fire via a series of mirrors through a nozzle that is guided by a gantry system along an X and Y axis to fluidly guide the laser through all of our precise cuts.
The teeniest pieces are some of the hardest to keep track of during the cutting process, but make for some of the most pleasing details in the finished result. The patience and precision is well worth it in this artform.
Next, the glue-up phase. A quick but crucial step in making your canvas a long lasting piece of durable art. Humble materials, but specifically designed to be as durable and long lasting as the wood itself. This phase, though simple it may seem, is when we find our experience with artisanal craft really comes into play. If you don't get this step perfect, it will be imperfect forever.
Like we said, during this phase the piece quickly starts to take form. After some long waiting during cutting and sorting all the tiny pieces, pressing it all into the glue in its final arrangement is really quite satisfying.
But not more satisfying than the final stage: finishing with Odie's Oil. This tried and tested all-natural, solvent free hard wax finish brings out the character of the wood like nothing else we've really seen. We've tested it against the crystal-clear factory finish our wood supplier offers, and while very nice, it just doesn't make the wood sing like Odie's Oil.
The finished canvas seems to glow in light, and the natural chatoyance in many of these hardwoods makes it look as if there are diamonds inlayed into the surface. Not to mention: it smells absolutely fantastic, and it sticks around on the wood for quite a while - certainly still there when your piece makes it to you.
Once the finished canvas has had 24 hours to cure, it is now a durable, water resistant, all natural piece of bespoke, historical fine art that will be yours for generations, a piece of fine art designed to outlive the wall it will hang on. One that has been handmade for you by artisans who have studied this craft over the course of a lifetime, and bring it to you through modern yet traditional handcrafted means.
Jessica was overjoyed when she received her piece in the mail, she couldn't wait to tell us how beautiful it really was in person. She almost didn't really believe it during the mockup phase, but once it was physically in her hands, the realness and quality of it was undeniable.
We hope you understand a little more about the custom commission process, and are imagining all of your most treasured images that you're excited to commission! We will be here and the lasers will be ready.
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