• Sullivanesque panel Nr 3600 Morton School, Hammond, Indiana

    A client purchased a number of sculptures for his home, one was the Morton school Sullivanesque frieze. We decided to do this interior cast stone version for him in the aged buff yellow finish and I think anyone can agree it looks very “old world” an just like a weathered antique fresh off the demolition site!

    The Oliver P. Morton High School, built in 1936 was located at  7040 Marshall Avenue, Hammond, Indiana and was demolished in the late 1980s. Once in a while an oddball piece or two of original salvaged terracotta artifacts come up for sale at pretty high prices. Many have chips and other damage to them as well as inappropriate removal by powersaws of their back sections; supposedly to reduce the weight, but which instead severely weakens the artifact and destroys it’s integrity.

    The amount of  “excess” weight removed is miniscule, on what might be 85 pounds it’s removing at best 5 to 10 pounds.

    Nominal 13-1/2″ high by 15-1/2″ wide, 3″ deep WEIGHT: 22#.

    Read more at: https://www.urbansculptures.com/sculptures/3600.php
    Copyright © 2014 Randall’s Urban Sculptures

     

  • My book

    After a whole lot of trouble and trying to come up with printer solutions I think I may have it finally under control so I can get my book printed again at a reasonable cost as before with Amazon’s CreateSpace (CS).

    CS did some kind of merger/change and I couldn’t access my CS acct or my book files to print more copies, then they told me they no longer just print books, so I wound up shopping for a new printer and found Lulu.com after finding every other printer wanted anywhere from $48 to $67 per book plus shipping to print them!

    When I was selling the book for $35 with postage included, now having to pay $48 to $67 just for printing, plus sales tax and postage to get it to me,  makes it completely unviable! Lulu’s price was comparable to CS’s price, but the problem was I tried at least six times to get my pdf files into their system and every time they went to process and print them they said there was “something” wrong somewhere around page 32… Well I looked and looked, resaved the files and on and on again and every time they uploaded and I paid for a proof copy and waited, a few days later when I was wondering WHERE the book was, I’d log in and see “ERROR” in red next to the files.

    So I went back to what was CS but is now Kindle Direct Publishing, opened a new acct since I can’t access the old CS any more, re-uploaded my files and now waiting on a proof copy to check.

    Hopefully all will look correct, and then I plan to order a bunch to have on hand so I’m not left with none and go to order a couple as needed and find the printer is no longer available or something!

    In order to get printing now, I had to put it on Amazon for sale, and because of their cost it’s $39.95 now plus shipping and tax thru them, I will be offering them still as author direct for less anyway. So THIS is the place to get my book not Amazon!

  • Morton school Hammond Indiana George Elmslie, Louis Sullivan Sullivanesque

    I’ve had this design in my lineup for  quite a while, but this week a client purchased a cast along with several others and I started thinking that since I need to order in some materials, maybe now would be a good time to order what I need to “convert” this design so it can also be offered in my hand-pressed kiln fired red terracotta.

    With an original selling for around $750 at salvage outfits I know there’s a lot of people who don’t want to pay $750 plus shipping for one of the originals, and only being able to obtain one, and it having chips and damage on top of that, but they would be interested in the design in a fired terracotta from me that can be purchased in the quantity they want or need at a quarter of that price,  and they don’t have to settle for damaged goods either!

    I’m going to have to make a new rubber mold to replace the old one I have for this as it is tearing due to the purple Quantum Silicones rubber I used years ago that turned out to be total garbage, once I do that I can  pour a rubber positive in the new mold and then make the plaster piece mold off that to use for pressing the clay version.

    The design is from the demolished Morton High School  (1936, Hammond Indiana) This was George Elmslie’s final project before his death. Elmslie was the chief ornamental designer for Louis Sullivan. This piece is cataloged as an M-5 Main building cornice from the book Architectural Ornament by Krutty and Schmitt.

    Louis Sullivan frieze Nr 3600