B.Light Design

Image taken by Naho Kubota

A couple of weeks back I worked on a table with C-Lab, Design Compendium, One Pot, Limn Architects, Highlands Dinner Club, and Architecture For Humanity. It was for the Design Like You Give a Damn Live celebration at the Armory on Park Ave in NYC. The goal was to get all of these great thinkers and incredibly capable people to sit down to a meal together, see what could be accomplished in such a short time (the meal and the table), become inspired, and basically change the world for the better. Simple, right?

Images taken by Naho Kubota

The project was on a very tight deadline, the table was built in two days. The first day (the one I had a part in) was gathering materials, cutting all of the pieces, redesigning on the fly, and starting to put the thing together. We did all of this at the studio. The second day (I wasn’t there for that) was a lot of finishing work and putting it all together at the Armory.

From the final images I can tell that it came together great (side note: the Armory is awesome). I got to work with some very talented and, more importantly, really great people. I’m very proud to have a small part in this project.

More images can be seen here.

The latest lamps I’ve been working on are made from walnut. The build process took place in three studios. The gluing up of the walnut took place at the Gowanus Studio Space in Brooklyn. The turning was done at the Museum of Arts and Design (MAD) Open Studios in Manhattan. And the finishing was done at my studio in the Poconos. The lamps kind of represent the spaces I’ve had the pleasure of working in recently.

The walnut was store bought, which I don’t feel great about. I typically like to know where my material is coming from, know its story. But walnut is such a beautiful wood that I will almost always make an exception. The lamps have built-in dimmer switches in the sockets and have black braided fabric cords. They are both finished with tung oil.

I have got to get my hands on one of these. The Egg Bot is an art robot. More precisely, an incredibly clever printer, only instead of printing on flat paper, it prints on round things. Eggs, Christmas ornaments, golf balls, and my particular favorite, light bulbs.

Image from Evil Mad Scientist Laboratories

The designs it’s capable of creating are so cool. With light bulbs like these, who needs a lamp shade?

A cool video demo on Martha Stewart.

I just got rid of my last piece of Ikea furniture, I’m officially an adult.

I’m finishing up a built-in cabinet at my place. Been been planning to do for years. The build went very smooth for the most part (thank you pocket screws). And usually I’m kind of against painted wood, but I figured a white cabinet would blend in nicely with my white walls.

I had a lot of paint left over from a previous home project, so I figured waste not, want yadda yadda. What I didn’t know is that paint can go bad. It gets skunked. Literally, it stinks after it dries. Seriously. We’re talking B.O. here.

Now this is very disheartning. I’m very pleased with the way the cabinet came out, but the smell. So after doing a little research, I discovered a trick. They say a halfed onion in a bowl of water kills the smell. I was skeptical, but tried it. And after a few hours of this I can safely say, my place smells like onions and B.O.

Update: 3 or 4 coats of polyurethane stops the smell.

Siegfried Schreiber is an incredible wood turner. He makes some beautiful shapes that he calls sensual, and I couldn’t agree more.

Via Notcot.org

This beauty takes me back to my Sunday school days. A school on 22nd and Lex was tossing out a lot of great stuff, I saw a guy walk off with a globe. I had my choice between this chair and an overhead projector. I stand by my decision.

I’ve watched this about 20 times, and it keeps getting funnier. Thanks Ric

If you need to ever get me a gift (not that I’m asking anyone for presents here), you can’t go wrong with a clamp. A clamp is my equivalent of getting a 10-year-old a Storm Trooper. It’ll never be the sexiest present, but you can always use another one.

A friend asked for the parts list to the pot racks I put together awhile back. These pot racks couldn’t be simpler to make. It’s basically connecting a few pipes together and screwing it to the wall. The hardest part is making S-Hooks. Off-the-shelf would work fine, but I’m weird, I think the handmade hooks look better.

2 - 3/4″ galvanized flanges

2 - 3/4″ 90 degree galvanized elbows

2 - 3/4″ galvanized close nipple

1 - 3/4″ galvanized pipe, the length will be roughly the length of the pot rack, I used 12″ and 24″

I also made some S-hooks. Off-the-shelf S-hooks should do the job, but I liked the handmade look. I used 1/8″ steel rod stock

I also polished the pipes with steel wool and then waxed them. I’ve done this every couple of years, keeps it looking shiny.