I have not worked on the lion this week till tonight, but that’s good because it allows the clay to “set” a little and firm up slightly. I added more clay tonight, for a total of 475#, what looks like a muzzle is approximately the lower jaw’s location, the head still needs to be built up and that “muzzle” is about half of the jaw, but now I will be adding clay more slowly to the top and allowing the clay to firm up a bit more. The back of the head needs to be built up a few more inches as well.

Rapidly now to the neck area of the lion and the need to give the upper body some temporary support. I needed to move things around in the studio so I could roll the model under my chain hoist so as to suspend a strap from that for support. My hand for scale reference

The most recent photo is directly below, compared to the photo below that one taken earlier today, it can be seen that I made some large corrections as I work. The torso was heading mostly vertically whereas the original lion leans forward a little, a fact not immediately obvious due to the shield, wings and other surface detailing, but he does lean a little forward. I also bulked up and moved forward the stifles, “knees” for those not versed in animal anatomy. Rapidly reaching the upper chest of the lion, and here is where care needs to be taken as there is now 350# of clay here, and the building…

This model is officially started now, no turning back! In looking at photos of the original terra cotta lions that were removed, and referencing the 1914 rendering’s measurements, it became clear the lion’s base was made thicker than the drawing’s specified 2″, it appeared to be closer to 3″ than 2″ so that I what I am doing, starting out 3-1/2″ thick and with the shrinkage it should wind up about 3″ or 2-3/4″ thick. Almost impossible to see unless you know it’s there and look carefully, the top of the modelling stand has a sheet of glass. I decided to use the glass rather than sheet plastic to prevent…

Having rec’d my shipment of a half ton of clay, I think I can say this model has begun. I finished the special steel and ply stand, its shown below. In the background are 20, fifty pound boxes of clay stacked up. Off to the right is another 750 pounds of raku clay, so I’m glad when I added this room on I built the floor especially strong, but then I knew I would be putting concentrated loads in like this. Closer shot of the new modelling stand, this is made of welded 1/4″ thick steel angles and flats, with 3 layers of 3/4″ plywood laminated for the bottom and…

I decided to go with the course red clay for the Grinnel bank lion model, cone 06 to cone 4 firing range, this test sample was fired to cone 1 where it takes on a nice deep rich brick red color, the brick red I’M familiar with, not the so called “brick red” clay I’ve seen that looks more salmon or brown than red to me. At cone 4 it says it turns “brick red” but the sample photo on their web site looks more like leather brown, definitely brown and that’s not “brick red” to me at all. The clay has 20% of 20 mesh grog and I believe…

Hand building the Sullivan bank lion out of wet clay, with an estimated weight of 800# or more requires not only some mobility method, but something to raise it up to working level, at least the most important portion of it- the face. So I designed and built this custom made modelling stand out of heavy steel for this task. I used 2″ x 2″ x 1/4″ steel angles for the 4 legs, 2″ x 1/4″ flat steel for the diagonal bracing, and heavy wall 1″ tube for the top and bottom with which to bolt the top and bottom plywood to, and to hold it all together nice and…

post no longer available

Now that this model is done and hollowed out in back, it is off the easel and laying flat to dry out, all the modelling is finished. Since I used the same templates I used on my wolf roundel, the 4 egg and dart border pieces made for the wolf roundel would fit this lioness. I’m starting to set up shortly for the next model, the companion piece for this, a lion which will face to the right so they could be used as a pair.