Making Exceptional Copper Wind Chimes

Handmade Copper Chimes, two sets of Copper Wind Chimes
Available at Coast Chimes

I sometimes see website tutorials on making your own copper wind chimes at home. They make it sound like you can read two paragraphs and make great chimes. I have to laugh. I've been making copper wind chimes for twenty years, thousands of sets, and I am still learning!

Above are some of the components that I hand make for my wind chimes. And ' hand make' should be underlined and bold. Sure, you can just saw up some copper pipes and string them onto a chunk of plywood with some fishing line. But that is not going to be beautiful, nor long-lasting.

From the old growth reclaimed red cedar roundel to the hand formed copper hooklets, these are the elements that take time, skill and experience. Most people figure out how to do something, and get better and faster at it. I have found with my chimes that I learned how to do them, and got better and slower at it. These days, I take far more care and pay far more attention to each element. They are a source of enormous pride for me, and so it's all worth it. And I know that no one is going to be reading a short tutorial and making anything even close to what I do.