My Chip Carving 110 - How to Carve the Lace Border

Today’s lesson I would like to show you how to carve the lace border. You will see the lace border on the rim of these box sets of the rose at very nicely. Here is our practice board that we have been working on and here is the lace boarder next in line. See how different it looks compared to the three quarter positive and three quarter negative, zigzag boarder and now the lace border. It gives you a totally different feel for project that you are working on. I will show you the latest outcome so take your practice board. [Demo] And the matches that I will use are the same as the dimensions we use for laying out for three corner borders. Come of the edge of your board a little ways, make a mark and then measure two millimeters, four millimeters, four millimeters, and two, two ,four, four, and two. Then using your t-square to make those lines across your board. I will make mine extra dark so you will be able to see them clearly. But, when you are laying yours out only make them as dark as necessary. So, that they are easier to erase when you are all done. There is a start. Now for this lace border, we are going to use dimensions of three centimeters across our board. So, I am going to start one centimeter of the edge. Then I am going to measure three from one point to the next, so three centimeters, another three, three more, and three more. So, I have got room on this board for one, two, three, four. Then take your t-square and we will just connect across the center three lines on your board at those three-centimeter marks. Now there is not a hard fast rule for how long each part of the lace border has to be. Just make as long as necessary to fit the piece that you are working on. At the box that I showed you earlier with the lace border, it was a little bit shorter than three centimeters. Okay, so there is the three centimeters section on carved on the lace border. Now to finish the layout on this, we are going to draw arcs from this corner to the top and down on the bottom corner. Now I can just freehand this and just draw a smooth arc from one point to the next. That is one way to lay it out, like that, and then freehand the other side. [Demo] Like so, but I thought of much easier way. You can find yourself a washer and this one happens to be the same size as this lace border, and I can just trace around that or even easier, I make a quite few tag board templates. Okay, this template has been cut to three centimeters in size and you can make your own whatever size you are working on, and I just go along my board with my template. Then line it up and draw the arc. I much prefer to spend my time carving rather than drawing these designs, so templates helps speed up their process. [Demo] All right, there is all laid out, I have got four lace sections to carve. Now I am ready to start carving. Everything carves on the lace border is done with the first position with your knife. Remember the tripod knuckle, thumb in the point of the knife creates your tripod, so that your angle of the knife place about 65 degrees. If need to review that previous lesson go back and take a look at it, so you surely use the proper technique as your hold the knife for these carvings. All right, let us start on this one. I am going to show you practice more once again before I start carving so you can see that this chip is narrow, gets wider through here, and then becomes narrow again. This is not a very deep cut so you do not have to go very deep with your knife. Start here, start shallow do not go very deep. Now as I get to the top it can go a little bit deeper with my knife and then draw the knife blade out to this point right here. Okay, I can turn my board and complete the other side of this cut, shallow. Now here is where I want to get some width. So plot now the curve a little bit deeper with your knife, and then draw it out to the end. That is one side, now we will do the other side and now here is the little bit wider part so I can go a little bit deeper with my knife and then draw it out to that point. Turn the board 180 degrees and now ready to come to cut the other side. Shallow to begin with, flat now the cut to give a little more depth and then draw the knife out to the other side. In a little part of my chip, hang up right in there and you can go quite deep enough that is okay, just come back, and very gently go back in and take out whatever it is still left to be taken out. Now, as the position of my knife does not changed when I enter the cut once again. Okay, so there is a part of the lace border. Now I will go ahead and carve this next three like I would do in a normal project doing one after another to save motion. [Demo] Then I will go tape my board and I will start down where I left of and do the same cuts coming back. And the--why does this, economy of movements save your time and make your carving go a little quicker, it also gives you more uniform chips because you are doing the same cut one after another without moving the board around. [Demo] Now I would go back and do the other side. Remember that your pencil lines they are just guide lines. So let your “eye” and your “hand” makes this cut as smooth as possible, we use those pencil lines just to guide you. Turn your board and will do the opposite side. [Demo] Now, there are a couple parts on this chip, these lace designs that did not come out, go back with your knife in the same position. Holding in the first position and just gently go in and remove anything that is left. Do not gout it out and do not change the angle of your knife. The one part on this chip that is delicate, are these sections right in here. If you cut too deeply, some of this will start to lift out on you. So if that happens you know you are just going a little too deep, come out with your knife blade a little bit to preserve these delicate sections of the chip. Now that we have the main part of our lace border carved out, we can add accents to it, as seen on this practice board. We can add three quarter chips along the outside lines and we can add negative three corner chips in the center. Let us start in the center and will add some negative three quarter chips in the middle here. Just eyeball this just about halfway of the center line there. You need to refresh on carving this three corner chips you can look back at the previous lesson. Do not go too deep, these are small, small chips and then opposite side. [Demo] Okay so there are three corner negative quarter chips in the center. Now I will add some along the edges and these move right along. Again, just about a halfway up and between each of the openings. Turn your board right back in the second position with your knife and then I slice and cut right along the line, and do the same thing on the opposite side. [Demo] Oh! I forgot the second cut on that one I must skip. No worries let us go back and do it now. And there you have it, a lace border that was used on the box like this. As you compare, you can see the difference and the width. There is a little bit from the box to the practice board we just did, and then remember that you do not have to just do a single lace border, but if you like you can double it or triple the lace border whatever you prefer. Enjoy your chip carving, remember proper technique and proper practice, we will give you excellent results.