All, I have been noticing the inquiries about buying niello. I use
niello in my work and know how inconvenient it is to make it and
even more inconvenient to buy. I will be making some in February.
Anyone who is interested in buying some from me should email me –
offline. I’ll sell it by the gram and my initial price will reflect
the price that Fischer charges with an additional charge for
postage. After the initial batch I will reassess the labor and
adjust the price from there. Initially I will provide the material
only in stick form. Ultimately, I hope to be able to figure out a
way to produce it economically in a very fine powder with the
limited resources at hand. Right now I hand grind my niello with a
mortar and pestle. That is just to much work to do on a production
scale, and it is too inconsistent in texture considering I am
selling it for money as a finished product.
The formula I use is the standard blue/black Fike recipe. If you
want to see what the niello looks like in a piece just get any
Metalsmith magazine from the Exhibition in print to the latest
current issue and find my advert. Or let me know and I will email
you a picture of my work.
Larry Seiger in central North Carolina where almost all the snow has
finally melted and where we are finally getting plain old rain with no
frozen stuff.