The Illuminated Tool series

As I near the end of art school I'm expected to take more initiative and to find my "voice." Part of that is  doing an Independent Study, a semester long project of my own design. I'm currently working under Constance Dejong on a series I'm calling Illuminated Tools.
You may be familiar with illuminated manuscripts from the Middle Ages, hand produced books highly decorated with illustration and gold leaf.

Source

I will be applying this methodology to hand tools, items that have come to be considered dirty, low class, and low value. Any good tradesman knows the value of a quality tool, but somehow a country built by tradesmen has allowed the production and sale of cheaply made and disposable tools to take over the market. I suspect this is directly tied to the lack of appreciation given to labor and craft based occupations and the decline of the middle class. But I digress.
My goal is to present high quality, hand made, usable tools that are obviously precious by their polish, adornment and fine materials.

I'll be making four items overall for this project, a hammer, a wrench and a drafting set (a compass and straightedge). These items represent what I believe are the three major stages of human industry that led us to where we are now: forming, such as smithing and hand working raw materials; the industrial revolution, when work became more about operating and maintaining machines than making products; and design, when concept and creation became separated.

I will be making everything but the raw materials by hand for this project, and many of my tools will be homemade as well. I'll also be learning completely new skills like smithing, forge welding, electro-chemical etching, and wood turning. I will also be practicing skills I don't normally use like polishing and drawing. Most of the materials will be forged steel and cast bronze.
This will be my primary project for the next few months.