How to Make a Shepherd's Shrink Cup, Part 6 (Brass Hoop)

Caution! You can easily cut your hands on brass sheets, so it's better to use gloves.
Cut 1cm strip from 0,4mm thick brass sheet. You can also use copper sheets instead of brass. I've also seen one shepherd's cup with a grey metal hoop (maybe iron or pewter). The brass hoop can be decorated with engraved patterns but that's another craft altogether, so you may just leave it as it is.
The ends of the hoop may be fastened with rivets and hidden inside the handle. Sometimes they are fixed to the handle with small brass or iron nails. And sometimes there are more nails fixing the hoop to the cup itself. If you are afraid that the nails may cause the cup to crack, you can fix the hoop without nails like this:

If you want to use rivets, wind the brass strip tightly around the cup and through the hole in the handle. Cut it so that the ends overlap about 0,5 cm. Mark the overlapping parts with a thin marker. If the brass strip is too hard and it cannot be tightened around the cup properly, then subtract about 1mm from the measured length. Then drill the holes. I found that mechanical hand drill works best for this.

Fit the rivets into the holes and cut them so that about 1mm is sticking out. Put the hoop on a metal surface and peen the rivets gently.

Hide the rivets inside the handle and slip the hoop on the cup.

Instead of a metal hoop, you can also use wooden hoop. You can easily create one from a hazel sunshoot if you split it and carve it from both sides until just a thin slice remains (some basket makers have a special tool for it). Then flex the hoop carefully around the cup. Carve an oblong hole on one end like this: 

Then wrap the hoop around the cup (with the handle in place) and mark a line on the opposite end. Add two skew lines and cut off the resulting triangles on both sides. Then taper both ends as thin as you can.

Feed the end of the hoop into the hole and put the finished wooden band onto the cup. If it is too small, adjust the hole a little. When the hoop dries, it contracts a bit, so it should hold tightly. It can also be fixed with a tiny wooden peg. You can prepare more hoops in advance and boil them before using.

Finally you can decorate the cup itself. It is common to carve the lower rim and sometimes also a decorative strip below the upper rim. I would leave the rim itself undecorated because it's more comfortable for drinking that way.

That's all for now. It is not more difficult than other carving projects, it just takes an awful lot of time. If you decide to try it, let me know how it turned out!

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