New lamp

The aim of this project is to make a bedside lamp for reading. The light should be of a pleasant colour, bright enough to read without straining, and it should not cast a significant shadow in the spine of the book.

Because I like illuminated paper, and balsa is easy to work without a workshop, I've based it on the building pattern of a model aeroplane wing. It's to be made from balsa and tissue paper using the same techniques that you'd use with flying model planes: Make up frames from balsa, glue tissue paper on, stretch it by wetting it then letting it dry, then give it a few coats of varnish.

I decided to try LEDs as a light source for a few reasons: One is that LEDs are quite neat and I like the look of a large array of individual lights. It's futuristic. Another reason is that they are cool (temperature-wise), and I knew this design wouldn't leave much space between the lamps and the wrapper. With some materials this wouldn't be a big problem, but with paper and wood, I'm keen to avoid it bursting into flames, because that could be dangerous.

Another reason again is that arrays of lights, by nature, are more customisable. I'd like the quality, brightness, perhaps colour of the light to respond in some way to the position of the lamp. Light will "flow" to either end of the panel, depending on the orientation of it, or something like that. Naturally, to begin with, a switch and sliders would do.

I've made this initial design a simple circuit of 20 rows of 5 LEDs (100 LEDs in total), with a 15v power supply. At the moment, I don't have any kind of lighting control planned for this iteration - It's much more as a test to see what the quality of light is like, and if it is even bright enough.

I bought some warm white LEDs from LED1.de, which seem to be the same as white LEDs, but in an orange tinted case. These ones have a wide angle and are made to be soldered directly into a PCB. I'm using sections of stripboard joined by wire links. At the moment I haven't got any resistors in the LED series, but the calculator says I should. Fortunately the 15v of the supply gives 3v per LED, and the voltage drop of these LEDs is 3.4v, so there isn't a problem at the moment, but I should get resistors if I decide to increase the voltage, or to reduce the number of LEDs in the series.

The pic above on the right is the testbed with 5 rows of LEDs (25). This was clearly not enough, so I doubled the density of the LEDs (left) and this was a bit better.

Still lots of issues. Brightness: I think I'm going to end up having to pack all 100 LEDs into this one small unit go get the amount of light I want. 50 LEDs gives a bearable amount of light to read by, but it isn't great, and it isn't really diffuse enough - There is a sharp shadow in the spine of the book unless the light is right above me. More needs to be reflecting off the walls and ceiling to solve this problem. Colour: This is a pale, extremely dilute orange, and not really warm at all. Probably warm compared to normal white lamps, but that's not saying much. Silhouette: The balsa ribs really stand out dark on the surface of the tissue and it doesn't look that great. I'm not really sure why I expected this not to be a problem, and I'm still not sure it is even a problem. I think I was expecting a result a lot more like those paper and cane lightshades, but that's not how it turned out. That the ribs are solid divisions makes it worse I think, so I wonder if cutting out the centres of the ribs would help here.

More work required!

Somewhere inbetween a passport and a library book, the look and feel of these wedding invitations evokes nostalgia for a simpler, more honest time when romance wasn't an industry and didn't need to be gilded to be special.

I wanted to make the recipient think of the Utility Scheme; of newspapers and string; ration books and the spare and sensible public property of a post-war nation.

All of these old-fashioned things are seductive in this modern age where a glitzy image sometimes seems to reign triumphantly over substance and function.

The invites use an notebook (black Moleskine Cahier) printed using black ink for the pages, and white ink for the cover. These notebooks have a card cover and very lightweight pages, with a sewn spine. The return slip is printed at the back of book, where the pages are perforated.

Each page was printed individually using a set of custom-made polymer stamps - 15 were used in total. These stamps were produced in-house using daylight-curable liquid polymer. I set the type in Trajan Pro and printed a negative of the plates onto acetate to use to expose the polymer.

The envelope is specially made to fit the book snugly, and made from rough card stock textured with lines like brown "kraft" paper. The addresses were drawn by hand with pen and ink, and the envelope was sealed with brown gummed tape.

Pottery is brilliant. I love it. I could pot all day. I've been potting for over a year now, off and on, and have just got membership of PUG (Pottery User's Group) which lets me use the pottery whenever there isn't a class on.

I'm not sure what's so good about it: It's resisted attempts to analyse it so far. But that doesn't stop me trying. When I talk to the other folk I meet there, I keep trying to define what it is I do like, and what it is I don't like... Fairly unsuccessfully really. I come out with lots of reasons I do this, and reasons I don't do that, but all this bluster really just throws my inexperience and my ignorance into relief, especially compared to those there who actually have opinions of their own.

It's imperfect - handmade. Which I explain is a good antidote to my usual detail-focussed way of doing things. I like things to be heavily structured and thematically contextualised, controlled, but when I'm sitting at the wheel with a lump of clay spinning in front of me, I don't have to worry about all that stuff. It's pure craft, pure practice.

It's a cliche though, to suggest that it's this antidote to the modern intangible world, but I can't help but agree at the moment. I've got loads of ideas too, pages and pages of sketches, which is unusual. I'm feeling quite unlimited by my skills - whereas I normally design well within my limitations (material or technique), I'm designing freely with pots, not much mediation. It's like I'm designing things for other people to make, except of course, I'll be making them, and I just have to discover techniques of making things as I go along.

It's very exciting!

I saw these pots once in a Jerwood Prize exhibition on in the Museum here in Edinburgh a few years ago, large round vessels which looked like they'd been partially turned inside out, and I was intrigued. I couldn't remember the name of the artist, but recently discovered it was Sarah-Jane Selwood. I love those pieces, and it's exactly those pieces (and really, not much else) that prompted me to go to pottery classes in the first place about 18 months ago. My neighbour in Newcastle used to have his own wee kiln out in his garage, and our house has a few of his pieces in it. Simple stuff, but beautiful - well proportioned and handsome. I was always interested, but never really interested in the actual results - only the tools and the materials. The fire and the wheel. Not sure why but the drain in the basin of the wheel holds a peculiar fascination for me.

I'm still not sure if I'm interested in the results - I suppose my laissez faire approach to the variability of the outcome indicates that it's the process and the learning that I'm excited about.

Some friends recently got married and I was honoured that they asked me to sort out their orders of service. I finished up with an a5 booklet with some nice textured paper covers and two folded inside sheets printed on drawing paper. The cover has a fun little cutout too, with a drawing of the couple's camper van peeping out. The booklet's spine was sewn with ivory embroidery yarn.

I was really pleased with how these turned out, considering how simple the design is. Just thoughtfully chosen materials that feel nice and have a homespun quality to them. Made up 100 of them for the ceremony, and it was very tolerable. If anybody would like me to do something for them, get in touch!

Ring a rang a dong

Had a couple of rings I designed made up at Shapeways, the amazing 3d-printing service run from the Netherlands. Apparently it's something to do with Philips.

Anyway, they do direct 3D printing in stainless steel and plastics - I ordered a couple of small rings in steel and a big chunky one in plastic. That one's not arrived yet. But these metal ones are nice!

The colour of the metal is as in the first picture. The goldy tint is extremely subtle, but I was using a funny coloured light that gets exaggerated with my shoddy camera.

The finish on the delicate one is very curious: It has been polished and is not even slightly sharp-edged, but the layered method of printing shows up wonderfully, and is very interesting. Not sure if it's entirely desirable, but looks interesting. The other ring is more robust and has had a tougher polish so looks smoother.

It's hard to see on the pictures, but the left hand ring ("I Love You Sprocket") has the letters ILOVEYOU imprinted into the faces of the teeth, or fins. It is hard enough to see that it takes some scrutiny, but not illegible: Exactly as I hoped.

The right hand ring is a design I came up with years ago, to go with this flawed half-carat blue diamond, but never had it made up. The claw setting isn't secure enough for wearing as it stands (no hooks), but could be made secure I think. I'm going to try a bit of polish or grinding on it too.

I'm open to commissions, or just being a cad technician if anyone is interested!

After much gentle pressure, I decided to make a new desk. This was also in response to the new monitor I got a year ago, that's one of these new fangled flat ones that doesn't weigh a tonne like my venerable old Sony CRT. So that means my desk can afford to be a bit more furniture-like and a bit less workbench-like. Personally I love the workbench aesthetic, but it's true that such conspicuous industry dominating the living room doesn't necessarily make for a serene home environment.

Here are some pictures of the desk I constructed when I first moved into this flat. It is HARDCORE, yes.

So anyway, if the main design conceit of the first desk was UTILITY and STRENGTH, the thrust of the new desk is UNOBSTRUSIVENESS. This is achieved two ways: 1. Make it easy to convert from it's working configuration to it's inert furniture configuration, and 2. Style it in such a way that it's industrial nature is not prominent.

Above is a scale model of the new desk pretty much in it's final iteration. I have retained the sliding under-desk configuration that gives me a whole desktop to play with, and be able to pack away in a second. For me, just a keyboard shelf would not do, because I do so much mouse-intensive stuff, including shooters and the like. A problem with this sliding desk is that the keyboard can fall off the back of it. This will be a bigger problem with this new desk as it is a good six inches shallower than the old one, and the desktop will slide out it's full length. So, what's not really shown on this model is that I plan to have a sub-sub-desktop that will be revealed once the sub-desktop is slid forward, not unlike the trap-door that luke skywalker falls through to talk to the Rancour monster in that film. This sub-desktop will allow me to push the keyboard and mouse right back and give me a full, empty desktop for drawing or whatever. I am going to get some metalwork done to support this, and am looking for torsion springs.

A second big feature, not shown on the model, is that the lower rail along the back legs will have another telescopic slide attached, and on this will be mounted a little shelving unit. This shelving unit will have a long shelf at the bottom for the computer to sit on, and a wide shelf next to it for the printer to go on, and the whole thing will be able to slide in and out of the desk itself. So it can be pulled out when legroom is required, or when printing, and pushed back under to tidy up in one fell swoop. I'm really not sure how well this'll work, but I hope it will kick ass. It isn't integral, so even if it doesn't work, then there's no harm done. It is essentially a tethered pedestal.

The third feature of this design is the cable and peripheral management. the back half of the uppermost desktop has a couple of cutouts in it that will have covers, but these cutouts will give access to a long tray/box that runs along the width of the desk and can be used to keep USB gear in. I was planning on building a little USB hub with a card reader into one of them, and have the other as a manhole to get to all kinds of other cables and sticks and chargers and stuff that usually don't have a designated home and just mess the place up. The back panel will have a 6 way surge protected power panel on it.

Construction:

This will be CNC cut from 18mm thick plywood. The legs are made of a few layers and I'll laminate them together before assembly. I've had one eye on manufacturability during the design process, and this should be flat-packable, and furthermore, knock-down-able. The back leg structure is a few laminated parts temporarily locked together with some pegs that could easily be knocked out to re-pack. The side panels (front leg/top rails) are likewise attached to the backboard and the back legs with slots, tabs and pegs. The under-desk is mounted on metal brackets I am currently pricing (or won't be, depending on the price...) and the sliding desktop is mounted on telescopic slides, bolted to those metal brackets too. The metal brackets themselves will be screwed to the underside of the rails in the side panel. The side panels could easily be pre-assembled and shipped as one unit, complete with bracket and slide. I am a bit concerned that the variance in the thickness of the plywood will spoil my fit a little. I am planning on finishing the wood with a limewash type of effect, bleached, then varnished so it's easy to keep clean. Will paint the metalwork white.

This isn't really cheap. With the CNC cutting and the various telescopic slides, and the bespoke metalwork, I'm anticipating it'll come out at about £500. I've been saving up my pennies and collected some parts already. It should be a fun build, and an entertaining project, and eminently suitable for those such as myself who have no workshop space, since almost all of the messy stuff will be done by professionals with big machines. Finishing might be messy, but even that could be made clean if the parts were cut from a plywood that has a pre-applied surface finish. This could easily be sold as a screw-free kit. Industrial partners, apply here please!