The mold is finished for this little lion block and the first hand-pressed terracotta is awaiting firming up before I can take it out in a couple of hours. The little lion looks like this in the cast-stone version I’ve had for many years as a wall plaque, but now with the addition of the block he originally had, it will make a nice bookend.        

I  gave quite a bit of thought as to how to provision these to mount on the wall and make it simple for clients to do so, unlike the cast stone you can’t embed steel in the clay for a hook, so I came up with a way to slide the heavy wire I use through two attached studs through a premade horizontal hole made in both in the moist clay. The screw slid through shows how it would work, and the hole where the wire is slid through can be filled locking the wire in place since it can’t slide out the other side: Meanwhile, I am boiling the…