Historically, the acanthus leaf has been used in carving to wrap linenfold molding in room paneling, decorate newel posts on stairways, or provide a finishing detail to the legs of trestle tables.In more recent times Martin Pierce has used vine and maple leaves to create decorative scenes in gold leaf to decorate his furniture, and fast-forward to now where the Willow leaf is both wrapping and decorating his door hardware.
Caption:
Willow leaves swirl around this sculptural bronze lever, softening its form and transforming functional hardware into botanical art.
The Willow leaf has been used as an artistic wrapping to soften the edges and add artistry to what would otherwise be merely a functional door backplate. Willow leaves are pulled together in a swirl to encapsulate a bronze doorknob and flow directionally as wind-swept tendrils to smother and bend an otherwise plain bronze door lever.
In the Hedgerow Collection, a stylized tree canopy becomes an upward-curving lever
From wrapping to fusion, in the Hedgerow lever it is not clear at what point the stylized tree canopy became an upward-curving lever, and arguably it never did. Each organic design has its own tie to nature, and in the Lizard lever a gnarly twig branch is literally the lever support for a suspended anole lizard.
A suspended Anole lizard rests on a twig-shaped lever in this sculptural design
Of all his botanical hardware, the Vine Collection best exemplifies its connection to nature. In the Grapevine entry thumb latch, vine leaves grip the undulating contours of the backplate. Vine leaves fall onto the plate’s surface, and moving entwined leaves create a lever. The thumb latch is a vine leaf that becomes a functional latch that opens the mortise lock and is also released from inside by vine tendrils stylized to form a curling simple turn piece.
Insects and vine leaves in varied life stages animate this limited-edition pull.
The limited-edition entry pull in this series combines insects with leaves in varying stages of life—some vital and growing, others holey and waning.