Fig. 15.
The material of which flowers are made is, first and best (as already stated), French cambric, but a great quantity of Scotch cambric, jaconet, and even fine calico, are also used. For some descriptions of flowers, clear muslin, crape, and gauze, are wanted; and for some very thick petals, satin and velvet are necessary. These materials are provided in various colors, as well as in white, but fresh tints have frequently to be given. These are laid on with a sponge, or a camel-hair pencil, or the petal is dipped in color; a quantity of green taffeta should always be at hand for leaves. The coloring matters used in dyeing the material for the petals are as follows: For red, in its various shades, Brazil wood is largely used, also carmine, lake, and carthamus. The best way of treating Brazil wood is to macerate it cold in alcohol for several days; a little salt of tartar, potash, or soap, will make this color pass into purple; a little alum gives it a fine crimson-red, and an acid will make it pass into yellow, of which the shade is deeper according to the quantity employed. Carmine is better in lumps than in powder; diffused in pure water, it gives rose-color; a little salt of tartar brightens the tint. Carthamus is dissolved cold in alcohol; heat, as well as the alkalies, causes it to pass to orange. The acids render it of a lively and pure red; a very delicate flesh-color is obtained by rinsing the material, colored with carthamus, in slightly soapy water. Blue colors are prepared by means of indigo, or Prussian blue. Sometimes balls of common blue are used, steeped in water. Indigo is first dissolved in sulphuric acid. This is then diluted with water, and powdered chalk or whiting is added until effervescence ceases. The liquor is afterwards decanted off, and the sediment, when washed, gives a paler color. Greater intensity is given to indigo by adding a little potash. Yellow colors are given by turmeric dissolved in spirits of wine, by saffron, chrome-yellow, &c. Green colors are obtained by mixtures of blue and yellow; violets, by mixtures of red and blue, and by archil and a blue bath; lilacs, by archil only.
The method of making a rose will give a good idea of the manufacture in general. First of all, the petals are cut out from the finest and most beautiful cambric. The pattern-shapes must be of different sizes, because, in the same rose, the petals are never equal; a good assortment of patterns enables the artist the better to imitate the variety of nature. When the petals are thus prepared, they have to be dyed in a bath of carmine in alkaline water. For this purpose, they are held separately by means of pincers, and dipped first in the bath, and then into pure water, to give them that delicacy of tint which is characteristic of the rose. But as the color of the petal usually deepens towards the centre, a tint is there laid on with the pencil, while a drop of water is laid on the point of insertion of the petal, to make the color there fade off, as it does in nature, to white. If the right tint is not given at first, the processes are repeated; any slight imperfection, such as is seen in the petals of most living flowers, being also accurately imitated with the pencil. The taffeta employed in making leaves is dyed of the proper green in the piece before cutting out. It is then stretched out to dry, and afterwards further prepared with gum-arabic on one side, to represent the glossy upper surface of leaves, and with starch on the other, to give the velvety appearance of the under side. This preparation, colored to suit the exact shade to be given to the leaf, must be just of the proper consistence, making the leaf neither too stiff nor too limp, while it gives the proper kind of under surface. Where the leaf requires a marked degree of this velvet texture, it is given by the nap of cloth reduced to fine powder, and properly tinted. A little gum is lightly passed over the surface, and when partly dry, this powder is dusted over it, the superfluous portion being shaken off. These preparations having been completed, it yet remains to give to the leaves, after they are cut out, the appearance of nature, by representing the veins and indentations which they always exhibit. For this purpose various gauffering-tools are made use of.
The material for the leaflets of the calyx in roses, is subjected to another process immediately on coming out of the dye, in order to preserve the firmness which it is necessary the calyx should have. To this end, the taffeta, while still damp, is impregnated with colored starch on both sides, and stretched on the drying-frame: when perfectly dry, the leaflets are cut out according to pattern. Buds are made also of taffeta, or, if partially open, they are made of white kid tinted of a suitable color, stuffed with cotton, or crumb of bread, and tied firmly with silk to slender wires. The stamens are prepared by attaching to a little knot of worsted a sufficient quantity of ends of silk to form the heart of the flower. These ends of silk, cut to the proper length, are then stiffened in kid jelly, and, when dry, the extremities are slightly moistened with gum-arabic and dipped in a preparation of wheaten flour, colored yellow, to represent the pollen. Each thread takes up its separate grain, and is left to dry. The heart of the flower being thus prepared, and fixed to a stem of wire, the smaller petals are arranged round it, and fixed by paste at their points. The larger petals succeed, some of which are hollowed or wrinkled, while constant care is taken to give them a natural appearance in disposing them around the centre. The calyx comes next, and incloses the ends of all the petals. It is fixed with paste, and surrounded with more or less of cotton thread, which also generally incloses one or more wires attached to that which bears the heart of the flower, and forming the germ. The whole is covered with silver-paper tinted green. The leaves are mounted on copper wire, and are arranged on the stem in the order which nature teaches, the covering of cotton and tissue-paper hiding the joints.
In addition to the manufacture of flowers intended as closely as possible to represent their living models, there is a large branch of the art in which the aim seems to be to depart from nature as far as possible. These fancy flowers are the fruit of the artist's peculiar taste, and are therefore as impossible to describe as we sincerely wish they were impossible to execute. There are also flowers of natural forms, but of unnatural colors, being made to assume mournful hues to suit the circumstances of their wearers. There are also gold and silver flowers, more resplendent, but equally unnatural. Of these, sometimes the stamens and pistils alone are metallic; sometimes the petals are gilded, and sometimes the leaves and fruit glitter in the same precious metal. An easy method of applying the gilt in any device or form, is to prepare a cement which shall fix it to the cambric, paper, or other material (this cement may be honey and gum-arabic boiled in beer), and then to moisten with it the surface, placing thereon rather more gold-leaf than is necessary to cover it, pressing it down with a cotton rubber, and, when it is dry, rubbing off the superfluous gilding with the same.
Flowers are also made in chenille, but do not pretend to an accurate imitation of nature. There are two or three methods of making them, the simplest being to represent merely the shapes of flowers; for instance, apple-blossoms, represented by small loops of pink chenille arranged round a centre. Another method is, to make out the distinct petals, by rows of chenille placed close together. A third and prettier method, is that of uniting chenille with ordinary flower-making. Flowers made of feathers may be extremely rich and brilliant in their effect. Yet ordinarily feather-flowers are more difficult than satisfactory, and there are very few of our own familiar flowers that can be successfully copied by them. One of the best imitations is that of the wild clematis when adorned, as it is in autumn, with its plumed seeds. These can be admirably imitated in white marabout feathers. Some of the most available feathers for flower-making are those found under the wings of young pigeons.
The manufacture of wax-flowers is carried on by using the purest virgin wax, entirely freed from all extraneous matters. Wax that is either granular or friable must be rejected. It is generally melted in vessels of tinned iron, copper, or earthenware. To render it ductile, fine Venice turpentine, white, pure, and of an agreeable odor, is added. The mixture is constantly stirred with a glass or wooden spatula. All contact with iron must be avoided, and if the vessels are of that material, they must be well and carefully tinned. When stiff leaves are to be executed, two parts of spermaceti are added to eight parts of wax, to give transparency. Much care and tact are needed in coloring the wax. The colors being in fine powder, are made into a paste by adding little by little of essence of citron or lavender. When the trituration is perfect, this paste is mixed with melted wax, stirring rapidly all the while; and while the mass is still liquid, it is poured into moulds of pasteboard, or tinned iron, of the shape of tablets, and is then ready for use. Sometimes it is passed through fine muslin as it flows into the moulds. Another method is, to tie up the color in a muslin bag, and wave it about amongst the molten wax until the desired tint is obtained. To combine colors, it is only necessary to have two or three bags containing different colors, and to employ as much of each as shall have the desired effect. These bags, far from being spoiled by dipping in wax already containing other shades, have only to be rinsed in pure water to fit them for coloring other wax. The colors most in use in wax flower-making, are pure forms of white-lead, vermilion, lake, and carmine, ultramarine, cobalt, indigo, and Prussian blue, chrome, Naples yellow, and yellow ochre. Greens and violets are chiefly made from mixtures of the above.
The wax being prepared, the manufacture of flowers is carried on in two ways. The first consists in steeping in liquid wax little wooden moulds rinsed with water, around which the wax forms in a thin layer, so as to take the form of the mould, and thus to present, when detached from it, the appearance of the whole or part of a flower. In this way lilac and other simple blossoms are obtained with much rapidity. The branches are also executed with wax softened by heat, and moulded with the fingers round a thread of wire. As for leaves and petals, they are cut out of sheets of colored wax of the proper thickness. These sheets are glossy on one side, and velvety on the other. To express the veining of leaves, they are placed in moistened moulds, and pressed with the thumb sufficiently to get the impression, which is accurately copied from nature. The petals are made to adhere simply by pressure; the leaves are placed on a little footstalk, and the latter fastened to the stem. The manner of procuring moulds for the accurate imitation of leaves, is as follows: A natural leaf of the plant it is wished to imitate is spread out on a flat surface of marble, for example. It is lightly but equally greased with olive oil, and surrounded with a wall of wax, which must not touch it. Then, in a small vessel containing a few spoonfuls of water, a few pinches of plaster of Paris are to be thrown, and briskly stirred till the liquid has the consistence of thick cream. This is poured over the leaf, and left till it is well hardened. It is then lifted up and the leaf detached, when it will be seen that the plaster has taken a perfect impression of every vein and indentation. Such moulds are rendered far more durable if they are impregnated while warm with drying oil. This gives them greater solidity, and prevents their crumbling from frequent immersion in water. It is necessary to impress strongly on all amateur wax flower-makers the necessity for having all tools and moulds completely moistened with water, otherwise the wax will be constantly adhering, and preventing neatness of workmanship.
The variety of the materials used in artificial flower-making was displayed to an amusing extent in the World's Fair. In addition to the really beautiful and artistic productions already noticed, and to the elegant flowers constructed of palm-leaves, of straw, and of shells, as well as of all the materials named in this paper, there were flowers fabricated in human hair, in chocolate, in soap, in wood, marble, porcelain, common earthenware, and other unpromising materials.