We’ve had a great stream of new designers and makers joining the workshop over the last six months. It’s been incredible getting to see the diversity in the work that gets created under the same roof, so we thought we’d introduce you to Adam of Azmy Anything. Adam has worked in the film industry for over 10 years, most notably as part of the Oscar winning VFX team behind Gravity. Drifting from the digital world into the physical has been a way to combine an endless enthusiasm to figure out how things work – with how to make things work.
“I’ve always been making and love making, so its hard for me to define what made me start. Part of it is a thirst to know all of the skills! (impossible) It’s the main reason I love working in film, which I see as the ultimate coming together of people from very different expertise. But my move into making the furniture and objects I do, came whilst going through a long building depression and the realisation that design and making works, for me, as a form of therapy, slowing me down and keeping me balanced. Its been a great way to focus and unlike film, have an outlet that is selfishly, mine.”
Adam has had a huge ongoing interest in space and science, which has inspired the globes which he is currently making; an idea that came to him quite suddenly whilst looking through a telescope.
“I had the urge to hold it, and rotate it. Whilst I love to make things that have a use, the idea of having a Moon globe was too exciting. 3D printing came up as an option for a way to make a very accurate depiction of the moon, but I really wanted to make this by hand, out of more natural materials and also get away from the computer side of things for a bit. Whilst that made me sacrifice it being scale perfect, it did let me go after the texture and feeling of seeing the moon up close.”
Making a globe by hand? Impossible you’re probably thinking. Not for Adam – he wouldn’t be called Azmy Anything if he didn’t think it were possible. In order to achieve what he wanted, he built a device to help him get an almost perfect sphere out of bowl blanks that laminate together.
“It’s a plywood lathe, powered by a sewing machine motor, with a router on an arm that arcs around the centre of the spinning piece. I also use this to make the craters once I have the sphere, by tacking on a colour coded map I made of the Moons surface using data from NASA. Adding this to the steam bent frame with a built in light, really enhances the texture of the surface. Peoples reaction is to touch it and move it around, its quite a childlike reaction, which I love.”
“The lamps in comparison, are quite a simple concept, which for me is a rare thing. I liked the idea of them being a single object (no base or angle arm), that you could either face out or away or even hang. A large part of its design came through necessity of the recycled solid oak flooring I wanted to use.”
It’s not often you have people making their own wood lathes and using the in the workshop space. Having the space to do that with access to woodworking machinery was crucial to the building and creating of these globes as well as the lamps. He first came to Blackhorse Workshop very soon after we opened, but had onlt really been using it regularly over the past year. The more his projects progresses, the more we wanted to be at the Workshop and now has a dedicated space here. He’s currently making a couple of moon globes to sell, some solid wood spheres for photo-shoots as well as a number of lamps.
“I’m also in the design stage for a couple of commissioned pieces of furniture. An expanding sewing and pattern cutting table and a unique drinks cabinet. Having access to equipment, knowledge and space is quite invaluable and unique, along with no longer infuriating my neighbours at home by sanding, sawing and sphere-making on my roof.”
To stay in ‘orbit’ with what Adam gets up to, head on over to his profile page on our Members Directory for links to website and other pages online.