Downtown’s Spring Street Historical Museum is now commemorated in cool, sassy jewelry! A necklace bearing its likeness was created by metal clay jewelry artist Tracy McComic of Wired & Sassy LLC, and was debuted at the June 6 Downtown Artwalk.
The pendant, a hand-created likeness of the facade of the historic museum at 525 Spring Street, took McComic a month to create. It was tough, says McComic, as “there were no pre-made molds, no ready made textures, no templates, no pinterest inspiration photos…nothing but a museum photo I snagged from a Google search and a strong desire to push myself to further step out of my comfort zone to develop my metal clay skills and problem solve.”
After seeing (and purchasing) the end result, we think Tracy did a really great job at her problem solving!
How did she do it? Well, she got micro, making lots of tiny layered hand cut and carved pieces of clay that were affixed to the flat base. After she fired the large first generation bronze image, she made a mold of it to create a 2nd draft on which she had to re-carve much of the details and add the 1st story columns. From there, it was simply a matter of refinement.
McComic decided to take on the Spring Street Museum at the urging of friend and fellow artist Maria 
Schmelz, who also works at the museum. After giving the building a hard look, she fell in love with the admittedly beautiful Spring Street facade. Her creation was timed for artwalk, and she donated $10 from each piece of museum-inspired jewelry to the museum. If you missed artwalk, never fear, the necklaces are still available. To see more of Tracy’s work or make a purchase, go to her Facebook page.
