I can do and make bunches of stuff: Everything from custom joinery to forging/blacksmithing, rough framing to leather work, sewing to crown molding, wood turning to machining, from bookbinding and letterpress to electrical, figure carving to heavy machine operation, throwing pots to painting houses, Electronics design to welding & metal fabrication. I am a rocket engineer at my day J-O-B so I have 22+ years of 2D&3D CAD design and I am a huge 3D printing, laser, and CNC machining nerd. I wear overalls a LOT, I am a pretty fine shade tree mechanic, and a decent small boat builder. I don’t plumb really well though. I say dirty words every time I try to fix an old galvanized pipe or have to sweat lead into a flange.
In addition to being the son and grandson of builders and tradesmen, I am also a child of both Norm Abram and Roy Underhill. I watched them both on PBS every Saturday after cartoons as a small child starting in something like 1981. Their combined influence has made me value the old way of doing things without being a Luddite and I can appreciate modern cabinet shop/woodworking tools. Case in point: I have a 3HP Powermatic 3520 lathe and would not even want to think about turning a bowl or platter on a pole lathe with a forged hook knife. On the other hand, while I have not given up a single one of my 5 routers, I found years ago that it is sometimes faster to grab an old wooden molding plane from a shelf and take care of an edge detail on piece of trim. I can be done and dusted with the plane in the time it would take me to find the right bit and set up the router.
For roughly the last five years, I have been focussed on the building of craft and craftsmanship in both my own work and in my community. I volunteer my time, shop, tools, and skill to help friends, family, neighbors, and acquaintances find their passion in handwork. To see the spark in a 12 year old’s eyes the first time they smack hot steel with a hammer or the foot-stomping joy of a doctor who has turned her first alder bowl are just some of the things that keep me excited and committed to sharing what I do with others.
I have a a full cabinet/boat shop, a small machine shop, an automotive garage with car lift, a semi-complete welding/fabrication shop, and a blacksmith forge in my 670 sq. ft. detached garage in a tiny quiet Seattle neighborhood. My cute, though long suffering, wife recently let me build an underground lair/mad scientist lab in 144 sq. ft. of now tightly packed reclaimed basement space that is home to my printing press, three 3D printers, shortwave radio equipment, a small X-Carve & Bantam 3-Axis CNCs, book bindery, video game den, rework bench, photo studio, soldering station, and leather workshop.
My everyday vehicles are each over 34 years old: a 1986 JEEP CJ-7 that I have fully rebuilt from the frame up and a 1987 VW Syncro Vanagon camper that I am currently rebuilding and customizing. Both are labors of love and have required skills from fabrication to machining, welding to auto-body repair, plumbing to electrical. Both vehicles are now in superb shape and very dependable.
Our home is a 1928 Craftsman Bungalow that we have torn to the studs and rebuilt piece by piece over a three year period and our small yard is full of fruit trees, flowers, a very large and productive garden, a couple of bee hives, and two French bulldogs running amok.