Material and Care

About Our Products
"Fragile" is not a part of our vocabulary. Our products are made of heavy gauge steel and are therefore very sturdy and meant to be enjoyed for many, many years. All pieces can be used indoors or outdoors. There is no reason to remove pieces from your landscape to accommodate seasonal changes - in fact, if you are fortunate enough to enjoy winter, our designs look great against a fresh snow!

Our designs are treated using a simple ecological process that produces unique rusting patterns. Each piece of steel has different characteristics and therefore rusts in it's own unique way. No two pieces will be the same.

Prairie Dance metal art will continue to rust as time passes if left out of doors. Please keep this process in mind when placing metal art in your home and garden. Your Prairie Dance art will become even more beautiful as time goes by, but we don't want your wood deck or favorite rug to be damaged!

Care of our Products
You will note on receipt of your order how carefully we pack our products for shipping using lots of protective padding and packaging materials. While our primary medium is steel, the finish we create on the steel is somewhat delicate and care should be taken to protect it from scratches. Each of our products is coated with a protective polyurethane finish, however it isn’t impervious to all manner of assault. While Prairie Dance products will manage quite nicely through famine, pestilence and a variety of everyday tribulations, it is possible to scratch through the protective finish with sharp objects and corners or by carelessly banging the pieces against one another.

"Oops! We've Done it Now!"
"Oh dear! We've scratched a piece of our Prairie Dance product! What do we do now?"

No problem. Use a soft cloth to remove any flakes of finish by carefully dusting. Very lightly rub the edges of the scratch with the cloth to soften them. Spray the piece with semi-gloss polyurethane such as you will find available in any local hardware store. Let it dry and spray again. Your scratch will be sealed and won't erode any further.

Outdoor Care:
Planning on putting your Prairie Dance sculpture outdoors? Want it to look just like it did when you took it out of it's shipping box? Spray it with some additional polyurethane a few times each year. Sun breaks down polyurethane and allows the moisture to come in contact with the steel. Eventually, your sculpture will start to age again...don't worry, it will not rust away...the pieces will be around for a long, long time. Many people choose to let nature take it's course and the steel age naturally. Others choose to preserve the patina by applying additional coats of hardware store variety spray polyurethane a few times each year. How often you spray the piece depends on it's location. Somewhat sheltered and out of the sun, one coat each year may be enough. In full sun and exposed to the elements, you may want to coat three to four times annually.