The Skills of a Blacksmith:Volume II, Masterting the Fundametals of Leaf-Work

Author: Mark Aspery;
Publisher: Mark Aspery, Springville, CA 2009
ISBN: 978-0-9815480-1-6
300 pages; hundreds of detailed black/white photographs; and patterns.

This book is a follow-on to Mark's first book: The Skills of a Blacksmith, Volume I: Mastering the Fundamentals of Blacksmithing. Once again, Mark completely covers the topic. He starts off with 85 pages of detailed instruction on how to make the tooling needed to create the leaves and flowers presented in the rest of the book. He covers: spring fullers, chisels; stakes; hammers and a filing vise.

Next he walks you through forging: roses; bamboo; cattails; chili peppers; ginkgo leaves; cottonwood leaves and branches; water leaves; calla lilies; jack in the pulpits; fern leaves; and finally, the archetypal blacksmith leaf – the acanthus. In addition to the botanical projects he also includes a stylized bird and instructions for doing split/branching work.

The step by step photographs along with the very detailed written instructions are easy to follow. Mark takes the instruction to a higher level by giving tips on how to approach the forging operations. For example: he suggests that when you are going to perform an operation on both sides of a piece, do the side that is more difficult/uncomfortable for you first and then do the side that is easier/more natural. When spreading a leaf along two sides of a central vein, it is usually easier to spread the material toward yourself and more difficult to spread the material away from yourself. So spread away first, it will be easier to match it when you come to spread the leaf towards yourself.

In my opinion, this book (along with Volume I) is a MUST-HAVE for any blacksmith interested in perfecting his traditional forging skills. The word “FUNDAMENTALS" in the title really says it all.

The book is expensive, $59 plus $4 S/H from Mark's webpage: http://www.markaspery.net/Book%202.html It is also available from other blacksmith book sellers.

Book review by Albin Drzewianowski, October, 2009

-- AlbinDrzewianowski - 14 Oct 2009