Rikki-tikki-tavi... Painting the Logo

We are getting down to the finer details now- like the name and logo! Nina designed the Rikki-tikki-tavi mongoose logo with his nemesis, Nagaina the cobra, inside the body. The design is inspired by Haida artwork, but we gave it our own flair. Their are no mongooses in Pacific Northwest native culture, and no cobras either!

Rikki-tikki-tavi was of course an Indian mongoose who was clever, very fast, courageous, and fiercely protective of his human family. He was, above all, "eaten up from nose to tail" with curiosity. The motto of all the mongoose family is...

"Run and find out."

That is precisely why we chose this bushy-tailed phenomenon as our namesake and guardian. May our little mongoose run fast and surefooted!

Here Nina is transferring the design onto the ama bow. We sanded the outline first, then marked the color areas with pencil.

We painted the light outline next, then filled in the body with the rust color. We painted the black areas leaving spaces for the small areas of white and red (for those "eyeballs of flame"). We are using the same Rust Oleum polyurethane as we used on the hull and decks. We'll clear-coat it too. We have a lot of paint left over as this product only comes in gallons!




		We are getting down to the finer details now- like the name and logo! Nina designed the Rikki-tikki-tavi mongoose logo with his nemesis, Nagaina the cobra, inside the body. The design is inspired by Haida artwork, but we gave it our own flair. Their are no mongooses in Pacific Northwest native culture, and no cobras either! Rikki-tikki-tavi was of course an Indian mongoose who was clever, very fast, courageous, and fiercely protective of his human family. He was, above all, "eaten up from nose to tail" with curiosity. The motto of all the mongoose family is... "Run and find out." That is precisely why we chose this bushy-tailed phenomenon as our namesake and guardian. May our little mongoose run fast and surefooted! Here Nina is transferring the design onto the ama bow. We sanded the outline first, then marked the color areas with pencil. We painted the light outline next, then filled in the body with the rust color. We painted the black areas leaving spaces for the small areas of white and red (for those "eyeballs of flame"). We are using the same Rust Oleum polyurethane as we used on the hull and decks. We'll clear-coat it too. We have a lot of paint left over as this product only comes in gallons! ^{Logo design copyright Nina Courtney. All rights reserved.}

	The final artwork... Bottlebrush-tailed Rikki-tikki-tavi with Nagaina, sporting his eyeballs of flame! "Who hath delivered us, who? Tell me his nest and his name. Rikki, the valiant, the true, Tikki, with eyeballs of flame, Rik-tikki-tikki, the ivory-fanged, the hunger with eye-balls of flame. Give him the Thanks of the birds, Bowing with tail-feathers spread! Praise him with nightingale words– Nay, I will praise him instead. Hear! I will sing you the praise of the bottle-tailed Rikki, with eyeballs of red!" from Darzee's Chaunt (Sung in honour of Rikki-tikki-tavi) by Rudyard Kipling (Can you guess the name of our dinghy?) ^{Logo design copyright Nina Courtney. All rights reserved.}

Behind the Bamboo Door...