How to make a brass bird cage dress in twenty-five easy steps

Step 3 Attaching shiny bits

I played around with the samples quite a bit. Since brass was a new material to me, I spent some time researching its properties and just getting a feel for the metal.

I wanted to make sure that I could attach the 1/16" rod to the 1/2" strap before I got too far down the design road. I asked around and was told that brazing it would probably be the best bet. I tried simply welding the rod to the strap with an oxy-acetylene rig and just made a mess. Regular plumbers solder didn't stick at all. I took a sample of the materials to the welding store and asked the guys there. They set me up with some brazing rod that *seemed* to do the trick. Seemed is the key word here. I thought I was in the clear and had found something that worked, however, the attachment story does not stop there.

For any larger, structural joints I opted to drill holes and use brass rivets. I picked up some of the old-style rivets that you actually pound out, because they look really amazing when they're placed.

The design ended up working best split into two separate pieces. This would make it possible to actually get it out of my front door (a good thing) and worked as a perfect way to get the person inside of it.