Repairing my Furin (Japanese Wind Chime or Wind Bell)

A few years ago a friend of ours who is half Japanese and grew up for the first several years of his life there before moving to the US, went back to visit his mother's family.  He brought us back a beautiful iron bell, or furin.  Similar to a set of wind chimes, they are hung mostly in the summer in Japan.  Either indoors near a window or outdoor on a eve of the house.  The ringing of the bell is equated with the sound of summer in Japan.  Here's some info about them from an online travel magazine:   

For some people, the relaxing sound of the furin paired with the sound of the Japanese cicada eases the summer heat.  The furin has a piece of paper hung from the center of the bowl shaped bell. When the wind blows, the paper catches the wind and moves the clapper to produce the sound. Thanks to the paper, the furin is able to emit the gentle sound that everyone likes enjoy during the summer months.  Furthermore, the paper is used to enhance the feeling of a cool summer breeze. The paper allows us to visually see the wind. Even when the paper moves from a light breeze, you suddenly acknowledge the presence of the wind. It is the secret of how to feel cool even on the hot and humid days of the Japanese summer.

The bell has hung on our porch for about 5 years now, but recently the cotton string broke, which in turn let the paper float away into the wind.  I though about repairing it with new paper and cotton string, but my friend Vikki drew my attention to another Japanese tradition, Kintsugi, or repairing broken pottery with gold, in order to highlight the breaks, rather than hide them.  Showing the beauty of the new life the object has received through repairing it.

So I repaired mine with some treasured bits and bobs from my beading stash, including a stunning handblown glass focal bead (the black one in the center of the string), some round quartz crystals, picasso art glass beads, seed beads, bead caps & spacers, and a large crystal pendant I've been holding onto, awaiting the perfect project.  I'm not sure it will ring as often as it did with the paper wind catcher, but I do love the site of it repaired and rehung on my porch, with the beads highlighting its ongoing presence in our lives, and reminding us of friends we don't see often enough.

Antique Silverware & Keys Windchime

About a year ago my mom decided she wanted a set of wind chimes made from old silverware.  She picked up some flatware along with various trays and silver portions of old servingware to use as bases, and mailed me a whole box of stuff.  She asked my dad to drill holes in the flatware, but didn't think to have him make some in the bases.  To be honest, I wanted nothing to do with making these wind chimes!  So the items sat around for the last 18 months.  But with Mother's Day looming this year, I decided I really should get around to making them, if only to get the stuff out of my house.  There was a great deal of trial and error, and some cursing.  Ok, a lot of cursing.  But I finally managed to get something together that would be well balanced and hang straight. 

I started by matching the silverware in terms of length, shape, and weight.  While she sent about 20 pieces, only 8 could be well matched into pairs, so there are 4 pieces of flatware on each side, in ascending order of length.  To give the strands added length, they are hanging from links of Czech glass and crystal beads.  I reversed the order of the flatware on the other side, so both sides would be equally weighted.  Once I got them all on there, and evenly spaced apart, I felt like there was too much dead space between them, so I dug through my stash until I found a bag of antique keys.  Then of course I had to make more strands of beads to hang them from, and added the keys in between the flatware.  Each bead is separated by lengths of chain made from individual jump rings and oval rings, all handmade.  All in all it was about 80 crystal beads placed on headpins. 

While I wanted to throw it out the window while I was making it, in the end I'm very happy with how it came out.  And most importantly, my mom loves it.  She has it hanging outside her kitchen/dining room window, so she can hear it while they eat.