Japanese Lamps

I have been so excited about all the Japanese paper that I made, and wanting to incorporate it into my furniture. This here is an edition of eight lamps that I am making using walnut, handmade Japanese Paper, and battery-powered LED's. Here are some pictures of the process and the first artist's proof:





The first finished piece, then all the little pieces of the rest















All the little boxes. I really enjoy working in multiples like this, and working small is nice too.














They are too small to fit in clamps, so I am taping them up for pressure while gluing.













So many hours of sanding! I sanded them all by hand.















A string of 3 LED's is wired up to three 3-volt batteries. (hmm... thats a lot of 3's)













Finishing them with a clear satin polyurethane.














The lamp, all put together, glowing in my studio.














A nice studio shot of the first finished piece.

Making Japanese Paper

This semester I was taking a short 5-week class on Japanese Papermaking. Here are some of the shots of this process:






This is the plant fiber called Kozo that has been boiled and will eventually turn into paper.












Here I have beaten the Kozo for 30 minutes to break up all the fibers and make them manageable.









This container is called the vat it is filled mostly with water and the small Kozo fibers. I have thrown in some longer fibers in the mix to create dimension. The square object to the right is the mold for making the paper, it gets dipped into the vat and sheets of paper are formed.









Finally, the wet sheets are layered and sandwiched between sheets of plywood. It then gets pressed together to squeeze all the water out and laid out to dry overnight.

Welcome to my blog! I will be using this to document my process while completing my undergraduate degree in furniture design here at the Minneapolis College of Art and Design.
Here are a selected number of my previous works:


RIGHT :
Checker Table
Walnut, Maple
2008


BELOW:
Biotic
Epoxy Resin, Natural Found Materials
2009

RIGHT:

Ripple
Ash
2009

BELOW:
Mission Style Table (commission)
Oak, Leather
2009

RIGHT:
Jingle Rocker
Steel, Rebar, Vinyl
2009


BELOW:
Trivium
Fiberglass, Steel, Cotton
2009





















RIGHT:
Unshelf
Poplar
2009


BELOW:
Zaisu
Steel, Foam, Fabric
2009