Walking the Fringe

I broke my foot almost two months ago.  The last couple of years have been a whirlwind of change and new beginnings.  For instance, I ate guacamole... this is actually a big deal.  There have been lots of changes.  One of the less savory changes was the loss of my old website, The Green Dragon.  The domain wasn't renewed and it was sold to someone else, who is not interested in selling it back to me.  This August would have made 10 years.

I'm still going to celebrate ten years in August, because I'm still here and I'm still making new and unusual things on my new website, Fringe Walkers Studio.  The broken foot gave me the time off I needed to build all this up and I'm just waiting for the search engines to find me all over again.  I thought I would use this space to talk about what is available on my site.  Hopefully some new faces will run across these curious products and come check them out.

The number one thing I have that fascinates people?  The antique reproduction Vampire Hunting Kit, to be sure.  It has a video on YouTube and a Facebook fan page, which you can locate by visiting my site.  I think it's the most interesting and complicated thing I've ever designed and created.  The items within came from all over the world.  Hard to find herbs, seeds and roots, tools, stakes, candles... even strike anywhere matches.  Would you believe those are practically illegal now?  This IS a new kit, an antique reproduction, but it looks old... that's the whole point behind the design.  Most people that build new kits buy a box at Hobby Lobby and fill it with store bought items.  That's why they are so much cheaper than my kit.  But I digress...

Other fun things I love to make?  Vampire Stakes and Magic Wands.  In ten years I have created hundreds of these and they have made their way around the world to their new owners.  I love doing a good job and receiving emails from happy clients.  It really makes my day, and it makes this job so much more worthwhile when it is appreciated.

Walnut Wood Magic Wand

Pecan and Walnut Druid Sticks

Purpleheart Mini Coffin Tobacco Pipes

Custom Vampire Stake

I thought I'd share some pictures while I'm talking about these things I love to do.  The Magic Wand on the left is made from Walnut.  It has a really nice curly pattern.




The Pecan and Walnut Druid Sticks are an example of a basic set of sticks.  I've had extremely fancy and beautiful Druid Sticks made from exotic woods.



 These guys are made from Purpleheart.  They are not very large.  They can fit easily in your pocket and you can look as cool as you please smoking your tobacco from these.






 This Vampire Stake has been on  my mind for a long time.  I always thought it would look really cool to have a square pointed end and a turned handle.  This stake meets and exceeds the expectations I had when I first thought about the design.  This one is available on my website.

Coffin Shaped Novelty Sign

This is the newest line at Fringe Walkers Studio, Novelty Signs.  These have proven to be very fun and they have gone over really well.  There are lots of new ideas about to hit the Studio's website, including a lot of regional New Orleans items.  This sign is for an imaginary Victorian Era shop called the Spinster Sisters.  They provide widows with all the essentials required by Victorian Mourning Customs of the day including hair and jet jewelry and the heavy black mourning attire that widows were forced to wear.  Times have changed, but you can remember them with this sign!  They have a "brother store," Graves Brothers, Undertakers.  Both available at the Fringe Walkers website.




 Thanks for stopping by!  If this little blog piqued your curiosity, swing on over to the studio and have a look around!  I am always happy to discuss custom designs that you might have in mind.  It's also our motto... Turning dreams into reality!

The Goddess Angizia

I resurrected my old blog, not knowing exactly what I would add or when I would add something after all this time. (The last entry was January, 2011.)  It seems the day I attach it to my new website, I have something interesting to report.  I first came up with the name ‘Fringe Walker’ in a rant blog that I occasionally contribute to.  I found Fringe Walker to be pretty cool, so my first thought was, what a cool band name.  Fringe Walkers.  Well, that didn’t really pan out, but during the time I was set on using the name, I went looking online for some cool Fringe Worthy photos and ran across a photo of a statue with part of the face missing.  I assumed that it was some ancient Renaissance piece that someone Photoshopped.  I still believed that until today, when I was doing research to find out exactly who the statue was and where it came from.

I had always believed the statue to be a man.  It looked like a man and it had seemingly short hair and wearing some sort of tunic.  I was endlessly scrolling through photos of Renaissance Statues until I typed in, out of frustration, half-face statue.  What I discovered was shocking… and cool as hell.  The photo that I used for the Fringe Walkers page was originally taken by an Italian photographer named Mimmo Jodice; one of the masters of Italian contemporary photography. 

“The name of the piece is Alba Fucens Angizia, 2008 and it was originally presented in a show called Figure del mare (Figures from the Sea.)  This show was composed of more than forty works and organized in collaboration with the Municipality of Cinisello Balsamo.  It gathered the latest and deepest reflections of the artist and entwined two key themes: the idea of the sea as a vacuum, a no-scape place.  The silence and lingering time is conceived as a reaction to the chaos of contemporary life and the persistence of the past into the present.  The representation of fragments of sculptured bodies and faces as left overs from the classical age in the Mediterranean civilization, which the sea itself has been in charge of preserving, reshaping, and finally returning to us.”

As I continued to look for information about this mysterious flawed statue that had returned to civilization after her long rest in the sea, I was delighted to discover that she is the Goddess Angizia. Angizia was a snake deity, famous for Her knowledge of healing herbs.  She was famed for Her ability to heal those who had been poisoned, especially those bitten by snakes, and She was said to have the power to kill serpents through spoken charms.  Unless I am mistaken, (from all the Italian translations with Google) the statue was discovered in Alba Fucens, in the region of Abruzzo, Italy, which was roughly the homeland of the Marsi, a pre-christian Pagan tribe that worshiped the Goddess Angizia.  To this day, the region of Abruzzo is still associated with snakes, epitomized by the Feast of the Serpari. This feast is first mentioned in medieval times, though it is likely far older, and is celebrated in the village of Cocullo on the first Thursday in May.

All that being said… I hope that the Goddess Angizia is not distressed that her ancient face is gracing the pages of my website.  I feel honored to have discovered both her identity and her photographer.  I never would have guessed that an image I suspected to be nothing more than a simple digital rendering would actually prove to be a photograph of an ancient pagan snake goddess statue resurrected from the Mediterranean Sea.  I live for these moments.

Check out my website, www.fringewalkers.com