| Sims says he prefers to make furniture that is more
subtle. "It fits into the whole, but it doesn't call
attention to itself," he says of his work. "It's the
things that people put on the furniture that makes it
the client's piece. I can't control that, so I try to
make something that will highlight and make their things
look nice." While his work may be subtle, Sims also
adds eye-catching touches to it with his marquetry. The
technique that he developed allows him to make marquetry
that is practically gap-free. He starts in a traditional
way, cutting out objects in veneer packets. He then
takes the original drawing and puts vellum over it.
"I glue the pieces to the vellum with spray adhesive,
and I take the entire thing to the photocopy place and
copy it," he explains. "I take the photocopy, put it
over the background, and I cut right inside the line.
Then I take the original objects and press them into the
background.
"I'm able to eliminate all the gaps by collapsing the
objects into the gaps," he adds. "At the level I work
at, I try to give {the clients} the best they can
possibly have. I end up with something that's 99 percent
free of gaps.
The one downside to the technique is there is not
duplication of pieces. "When I cut out a flower, I only
get that flower, and not another flower that's mirror
image of it," he says. "It takes longer, because there's
no duplication of anything. But it allows me to have
better control of the product by doing it that way." |
