This cross took me forever to make, but I finally finished it. I'm not a particularly religious guy, but being of Lithuanian decent, I have always been fascinated with iron crosses. These were placed at entrances to villages, on church steeples and in cemeteries. Their designs ranged from fairly simple, to super ornate. I chose one somewhere in the middle to try and reproduce. The most difficult part I encountered was how to hot slit the three smaller cross arms and then forge the two "legs" back to square and appearing uniform. After much trial and error, I think I finally got pretty close. The first image is the original black and white photo that I worked from. The rest of the images are of the cross I made. I tried to keep in the spirit of the original by using only "old fashioned" methods of joinery. The finished piece measures about 39" x 54".

great work!

Greetings Dog,

 

Lots of forge time and many challenges in that one..  Nice to see you keeping up with the traditional forging methods.   Fine piece of art..

 

Forge on and make beautiful things

Jim

The piece looks very fun. Good work. Now you can try out some historical paint and hand brush it on. I hope it's out in the public soon for everyone to enjoy!

My plan is to install it in the yard of the Lithuanian church my mom was involved with. She passed away from cancer a couple years ago and I wanted to gift it to them as a memorial in her behalf. I still need to find a decent sized pine tree that I can sink into the ground and mount it to.

Nice job, did you use square rivets to stop the elements moving, or other method ?

Nice job, did you use square rivets to stop the elements moving, or other method ?

On the backside, I lightly countersunk the rivet holes, then chiseled a couple notches into them so that when I formed the rivet head, the hot metal would embed itself into the notch holding the pieces in place.

Beautiful cross. I was not familiar with that style. Thanks for sharing.

Very nice, I like it. I'm more than a little fond of pieces with a story behind them and this one has a fine one.

 

Can you tell us about the style of cross? I'm not familiar with it but that's not too surprising there is a world of things I'm not familiar with.

 

Well done.

 

Frosty The Lucky.

I like it, I really like the idea of notching a crotch for the peened side of the rivet, never occurred to me, gotta love this site, always getting some tidbit to add to my fumbling around!! Thanks!

dog thats lovely! i particularly like the split arms - and the large rivets look great  -  the whole thing is really unusual :) nice one!

Thank you all. Here's a link to a page showing many more designs.

http://www.google.lt/search?q=geležiniai+kryžiai&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=tmMNU_2GJ8b9oASGm4KIDg&ved=0CC4QsAQ&biw=1635&bih=858

While on the subject of crosses, check out this.

http://www.google.com/search?q=hill+of+crosses&client=safari&rls=en&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=qWQNU662FdPdoATiuYGACw&ved=0CAkQ_AUoAQ&biw=1635&bih=858

Lithuania takes there crosses seriously. Kinda strange seeing it was one of the last european countries to be converted to Catholicism. This is actually a very moving place,  I think Pope John Paul even held mass there.

dog nose those crosses are really something - very beautiful - some of them are so soft looking - i particularly like this one

 

 

also the hill of crosses - amazing, i love a place where we can go mad with piling things up, and nobody says "thats enough". places that mean things to people. i expect it is a very powerful place to be. thanks for that!

Because you like crosses check out the grave marker cross my great grand father and great uncle made around 1900 for the family plot. It stands around 10 feet high. They are the people in my profile picture standing in there shop in Burlington VT.

Thanks for sharing that Paul. Do you think because of it's age, all the scrolls were forged by hand? I'm used to seeing that sort of of scroll work in today's "iron work", but now it's mostly done with bending devices. They're so uniform and symmetrical, even after all this time. One side is like a mirror image of the other. On a side note, how did you isolate the image of the cross from the background, and are you able to post a pic of it in it's current location with the background included? Thanks again.

It's really beautiful, I'm wishing to learn how to make these myself. Any suggestions? 

It's really beautiful, I'm wishing to learn how to make these myself. Any suggestions? 

​Welcome aboard Kas Cia, glad to have you. If you'll put your general location in the header you might surprised how many IFI members live within visiting distance.

Without knowing something about you and your skill levels there isn't much we can suggest that isn't obvious. For instance take lessons and practice till you're good enough. I'm not saying that to insult you it's an example of what I'm saying about not knowing enough to make meaningful suggestions.

How long have you been blacksmithing? Where are you located? Have you attended schools, seminars, private lessons, etc. or are you self taught? How well equipped is your shop? Do you have power tools, what kind, how many? The list of questions would  be endless if I have to start out knowing nothing.

Frosty The Lucky.