To escape the over intellectualized world I was stuck in, I enrolled in a Machine Shop class at the Crucible* in Oakland, California. I knew nothing about metal and at this point, I was interested in ‘researching” how the smallest details of a door are made to understand how a small piece of a bigger whole could affect how the entire thing operates. So I learned how to thread , turn, mill, cut, and grind steel, brass and aluminum. I learned all about the tools used to make the smallest pieces in the architecture design. I wasn’t and am still not sure how important it is that I now know how to make a screw, but I was learning from people who didn’t ask so many questions and at this point, that is all I wanted. When I had developed a general knowledge of how to make my way around a Machine Shop, I wanted to know where these little chunks of metal came from, so I enrolled in a Foundry and Blacksmithing Class. I continued to learn and understand more about the material and saw how and why it had influenced so many past architects who had previously been craftspeople. I also realized that what I was interested in was not knowing exactly how things were made in order to create a beautiful object but rather how things were made and how they influence WHY we make what we do.
And this is where it all unfolded. There was no linear path. It was a complete mess. But in all of the chaos, I found it. I looked intensely into all of the components of architecture I was interested in and slowly, very slowly, it uncovered itself.
foundry fundamentals
January 2013
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