A True Rustic and Refound
You know, I have done some crazy things before. I will admit it. I am always looking at something and seeing something else that it could become. This is the story of a true Rustic and Refound!
You might be looking at this, at first glance, and asking yourself, what is it? Before the deep dive and history of this piece…it is a wall mirror.
What is it, What Will it Become?
True story to my rustic and refound… Let’s just say that it has been more than a minute since this piece of “art”/mirror was created. While out riding horseback in the sagebrush hills checking our cows, I rode past an old dump site. You know the old dumps where old bottles sparkle in the sunshine and rusty tin cans are everywhere and pieces and parts of dead cars have come to rest. This piece of rusted out accordion folded metal circle was laying atop a pile of rusty, weathered cans and caught my attention. Upon inspection I felt the need to take it home. Using my saddle strings, I fastened it to my saddle for the return ride to the pickup.
It wasn’t too difficult to tie to the saddle, except my horse wasn’t having much of a proud moment with me. He balked at the sight of it, stepped away a few times until I managed to gain his trust that it wasn’t going to eat him.
It was a rusty, crusty…I don’t know – whatchamacallit with the center and outer edge rusted out. My first guess that it was an old rusted out enameled pot. I’m pretty sure that is the true identification of this piece.
The second my husband saw it tied to my saddle was the start of the rolling of the eyes, and the “What the hell is that?” And “What are you going to make with that?” “Why you dragging home a piece of garbage?”
Mirror Construction of a Rustic and Refound
Since I am unable to show you how I assembled the mirror to the back, I will give a short run-down.
1st Step: Cleaned the rusted pot, whatchamacallit with soap and water.
2nd Step: If you look close at the 8:00 O-clock position of the outer edge you can see that the object had split and had an entire piece missing. So here I added and glued a piece of rusty metal to disguise the breakage.
3rd Step: I sealed the entire piece with sealant.
4th Step: The mirror was mounted to a square piece of thin wood using E-6000 glue.
5th Step: I spray painted the washers and bolts to look rusty before using.
6th Step: Using pre-existing rusted “holes” in the metal I used washers and bolts to attach the mirror and board to the metal pot. Before attaching the mirror, I pre-drilled holes in the wood mirror mount where the bolts should line up.
This is a one-of-a-kind item made from desert junk. Using all of its rusty – crusty goodness I used my vision to see something and imagined what it could become.
That’s it! This was the start of Rustic and Refound!
