[Ansteorra] In need of a crown, so to speak

[Elric Dracwin]

Sadly they are in a poor state of repair. HL Malaki Dracwin and I inspected
them at AAA and noted many missing pearls and obvious "drop" damage though
the stone inlay was intact. The Ansteorran star in the "laurel tree" at the
top of the imperial arches was missing from one (or was that both?) of them.

To my knowledge they have only been used in court those two times. They have
been put on display a half-dozen or so times. Malaki and I were surprised
when his design was selected. Though beautiful and well researched we
thought they were a little more than what would be worn by most Crowns. They
don't weigh as much as the English coronation crowns but they are more than
twice the weight of the Ansteorran daily wear crowns. However, a commission
from the King is not easily turned away so I engineered them and we began
construction. Ask Malaki to see the pictures he has from when they had just
been completed.

A little trivia:

Each crown has over 200 pearls individually mounted on pins and over 1,000
inlaid malachite laurel leaves. The Ansteorran stars are inlaid jet. The
Ansteorran stars at the top of the imperial arches were sandblast cut from a
matching pair of obsidian slabs which had been shear cut from a thick slab.
They were cut so the banding would be identical and "cutting" took about 40
hours each. The imperial arches are removable for a less formal look (and
reduced weight). The velvet bonnet inside the arches and the fur trim on the
bottom are removable in case you want a different color. They have
adjustable lace and pearl accented straps on top and swappable padding
around the bottom to help fit them to the King and Queen. The late Master
Edward de Orleans handcrafted a pair of wooden boxes designed secure the
crowns from movement. Mistress Cerridwen and her sister Lady Yvonne created
pillows each with a raised oval for more secure placement which were
embroidered with the King's or Queen's device. It took the two of us 3 years
to complete the pair. The total cost was about $650 in materials including
the boxes and pillows.

Don Elric Dracwin
Baron Wiesenfeuer
Crownsmith

-----Original Message-----
From: ansteorra-bounces at lists.ansteorra.org
[mailto:ansteorra-bounces at lists.ansteorra.org]On Behalf Of Brian
O'hUilliam
Sent: Friday, March 21, 2008 11:19 PM
To: Kingdom of Ansteorra - SCA, Inc.
Subject: Re: [Ansteorra] In need of a crown, so to speak


They last appeared at AAA when Annes had them in history display.  TRM
Miguel and Conal II also processed into one of their Courts (I think it was
stepping down) using them.

Brian



On Fri, Mar 21, 2008 at 10:27 PM, Jerry <dreifuerst at gmail.com> wrote:

> Oh, my!  Are those *still* in use?  Last I saw them were on Bear and
> Catherine's heads 16 years ago.  I thought they'd been relegated to the
> annals of history.
>
> Othar
>
> >Date: Fri, 21 Mar 2008 12:22:57 EDT
> >From: Baronman at aol.com
>
> >Which one?????  The crown the king and Queen usually wear, or the
>  Imperial
> Margerine crowns?
> >Bors