I will go into what I began this creation with, the very first component I used to get the ball rolling. I was gifted a garden fork with a broken prong with an accompanying spade that held a similar fate. My thought process was to create the place that the dragonfly would be mounted so I could size up the overall size that we wanted and that was 3 foot tall. The first step was to cut off the end prong leaving the 2 centre ones in place.

Once that has been done. I could now fit the 2 remaining prongs into the forge to get some heat onto them. In the photo the fork has a hint of glowing red. Into the vice and away we went with the vice. I wanted to bend the prongs until they touched. To keep it symmetrical this was more precise than with a hammer and I could monitor the shape as I closed the vice.

Once this one was done, I heated it up again. This time to bend the prongs over to a 90 degree angle that the dragonfly could perch on. I also made the tips of the forks flick up. This was done with a hammer and anvil. My original intention was to make this into a hook so a plant or something similar could be hung but I didn't go any further with that idea because as it turns out. I just really liked the shape I ended up with so I left it there. Sometimes it's best to let things naturally happen and this was one of those instances.

Let's get into the beast. I selected this part to be the main part of the body that I could build from. I believe it to be a shaft from a Ducati motorcycle that had been rebuilt. It had a film of oil on it so I whipped over it with a blow torch. The tapering shape was perfect as soon as I picked it up. The sprocket end is the side I could mount the head to and the other end I could extend into the long tail.

Speaking of the tail. I wanted a texture rather than a flat tube like body. These wood augers were perfect. One of them even was painted green up the flute of the drill. I wanted to keep this on there dragonflies often have green/blue tones to them so that was very fitting.

Joining the Ducati shaft and the wood augers is not something I have heard in a sentence before but yet here we are. This was the main body length not in place that I could build up further. An exciting step that was the first moment of thinking this is starting to come together.

I wanted to create some delicate looking legs. Also the correct amount as I sometimes see this as 4 or even 8. 6 is the number on a dragonfly. I have a box of chunky nails and these were perfect for the job in hand. I heated these up with a blow torch and formed them this way to control the shape much better.

Once I had welded these on I could then tweak them so the dragonfly was balanced on her feet. This was crucial as it would affect how the finished article would stand on the base and not be lopsided and looking like she had had a few pints down at the local pond.

On to the base and the beginning of the vine. Rebar is one of my favorite materials, It is very industrial looking. It's recognisable and it is a great thing to work with that I have used on many projects. I started by getting a full length and welding one end to the base. It needed to be fixed on tight and allow me to pull and tug at it as it began the process of inding the wine up to the top

Up we go! For this task I purchased a new workshop gadget. A gas torch that I could hook up to the propane bottle that powers my forge. My limitations with my forge are that it is not very big and having to heat items up, remove them and shape them with my anvil and repeat. perfect for smaller mobile pieces but certainly not a job like this. It is a new skill for me to learn. Including something like this that I could experiment with. This includes limitations and new opportunities to be able to shape a piece of metal already welded on to a sculpture. 

The vine in this case. I heated up small sections at a time until they had a nice red hue to them and with the leverage of the rest of the length of rebar I could twist it around the fork handle. heat, bend, repeat.

The final part to this was once I reached the top was to feed the last bit through the fork prongs. Now when I look at photos like this the rebar almost looks like it would be easy to form like a big piece of string. It is easy to forget that it's a solid piece of steel and the only bit I can bend is the part I have heated. Once it was hot enough I used a spanner to gain enough leverage to be able to bend it from it being vertical in the air to its finished position bent under the fork prongs.

Boom. Next job. I wanted the vine to have some life to it. Leaves needed to be added and for this task I cut up some spanners and used the heads of these attached to some small pieces of rebar to give them some reach. Spanners are one of my favorite things to use because they are jut recognised by absolutely everyone and give the piece a connection that you can relate to. My personal rule when slicing up spanners is do not do this to the holy grail, The 10mm. All others are fair game!

As I welded these one from bottom to top it was really starting to shine and my vision was coming into fruition. I often reach a point where I feel I can begin to relax and start having some fun. This was that moment.

I wanted to incorporate a flower to the top of the vine that we twisted earlier. I had a seized bearing and to tie in into the rest of the plant I went for the spanner heads yet again. Not a 10mm in sight! 

For the flower I wanted to keep an unobstructed view of the flower and petals so I decided to weld it onto the rebar from the back. It makes it look more natural and little touches like it can be overlooked. The more I work on the more I give myself room to think about details like this.

Here is the finished flower in the daylight after being cleaned up.

Over to the face. I made the mouth from some piano wire cutters and the eyes are two bigs mild steel nuts with some ball bearings to make those insect eyes a big feature of the face

This is also a good view of the legs we made earlier. The whole dragonfly sits upon a chunky ring with the front legs in the air. To me this gives the dragonfly a lightness and a look of ready to take off.

The top of her head I have used a section of a piece of a tool box that was blue that has an awesome patina to it. Again a striking reference to the colours within a dragonfly. With most of my creations I don't like to paint things. I like to find items or tools which already have a colour to them. It's a way of introducing colour but without looking at what i would describe as a slightly fake painted colour.

You can see the finished wings here. I overlapped them and added extra pieces of the allotment rings plus a spanner in each one. I really like being able to see through the wings as on a dragonfly they are transparent. 

The overall length can be seen here as it tapers down to the end of the tail that I applied some heat to. This resulted in a nice flick and added a little bit of life to what would have been a bolt straight piece of metal.

The very bottom of the base. Inclusive of the brake disk which originates from a Volvo. I made some twisted and gnarly looking roots with some twisted and distorted spanners. These break up the shape of the brake disk and make it look more organic. In an odd way I think because it breaks the shape up a bit it does take your eyes away from the sharp circular edges and lets you enjoy the dragonfly more.

This was really fun to create. It was also quite a lovely scale to work to as well as usually my creations are much smaller and a bit more fiddly to piece together, It did give me more freedom to place things where I wanted them. I also enjoyed the mixture of components and their origins. 

please see below for a link to my instagram video "A making of" and the folktale story I have written to accompany the creation.