Custom Brushes (100% handmade without lathe)
I use different types of wood or hybrids for my brushes:
- olive wood/epoxy mix (Southern Italy, Calabria)
- briar wood/epoxy hybrid (Southern Italy, Calabria)
- pure briar wood (Southern Italy, Calabria)
- pure olive wood (Southern Italy, Calabria)
- bog oak (certified with carbon method, 4.880 years old)
The complete set consists of a safety razor made of stainless steel (with packaging made of hand-tanned leather), a stand for the razor made of the wood you choose for the brush and a bowl – also made of stainless steel.
The procedure for the hybrid woods olive wood/epoxy and root wood/epoxy and the bog oak is as follows:
The wood is stabilized before pouring, this takes about a week with drying times. Many types of wood are hard enough to be used as material for all kinds of objects, be it art objects or other everyday objects. But some types of wood are too soft or too unstable and attacked, which is why you run the risk of damaging them. They also lose their hardness and grip after processing and eventually even their substance. To counteract this natural ageing process, I stabilize the wood using a vacuum chamber, very thin MMA (the base material of Plexiglas) and acetone.
After stabilisation, the original material has characteristics of both this base material and wood; a hybrid material has been created. Now the wood can withstand greater stresses and has a stronger structure. Large temperature fluctuations, weather-related damage, solvents, acids, soaps, water, high humidity and strong UV radiation no longer affect the material.
The wood is then placed in a mould and filled with coloured epoxy resin. After about another week, the block is further processed and brought into the right shape with rasps, files and sandpaper. This process takes about another week, depending on the complexity.
The natural woods go through a similar process, but the chemical stabilisation is omitted. The root wood, for example, is coloured with natural dyes (depending on the customer’s wishes) and lies in an oil mixture of three different oils (tung oil, linseed oil, orange oil) for about 10 days to seal it.
Each brush is made 100% by hand in about 90 steps. The final sealing is done with 2 layers of special epoxy resin, four sandings (grit: 120, 240, 320, 400) and six polishing (grit: 360, 500, 1000, 2000, 3000, 4000). At the end, the handle is prepared for shipping with a high gloss paste and a wax/oil mixture “developed” by me, and the knot is reliably glued with a 2K product.
The packaging is made of hand-tanned leather from Tuscany and can be personalised with the owner’s name (or initials). On the underside of the brush I usually stamp my seal (PT) and the year of production.
You will receive a certificate of ownership with the brush, certifying the origin of the materials and their nature. Each brush enjoys a lifetime guarantee, I also enclose a small set of rules.
Pennelli Talarico 