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View Full Version : The door handle avalanche



artful bodger
31st July 2014, 08:42 PM
Just finished the latest order of door handles
320999
Celery top pine,spotted gum and Tas oak in this lot. The ones on the far left.......put your sunglasses on, next photo is a tad overexposed.
321000 are more pulls than handles, they are eventually recessed into sliding doors to give an internal finger hold.
Have been turning these and similar ones for an architect couple for perhaps the last 2 years and the orders have been increasing exponentially. The architects are very sharp marketers!.
Making them is pretty repetitive and boring but its a good hourly rate.
Recently another turner has joined in as it was getting too much for me.
I guess it's just a "bread and butter" sideline for the architects who would have bigger fish to fry elsewhere but it goes to show that there is indeed scope out there to make money from new original ideas.

chuck1
31st July 2014, 08:55 PM
Looking good! Ahhh production runs can do you head in! If I lived closer I would lend a hand!

tea lady
31st July 2014, 11:02 PM
Ah Interesting. I think architects get a bit of kudos from designing and making furniture. (Not that they actually "make" the furniture. The actual people who do the making are invisible.)

dabbler
1st August 2014, 01:38 AM
Nice work pieces even if repetitive. And they will live a functional life.


Ah Interesting. I think architects get a bit of kudos from designing and making furniture. (Not that they actually "make" the furniture. The actual people who do the making are invisible.)

I have always thought this too. My daughter is half way an architecture degree. Each new semester she is exposed to and trained in an increasing range of woodworking gear. The department’s workshop is enviable, full of all sorts of goodies.

The idea is they build their own models and at the same time gain some knowledge of material properties. It must work to some extant. The complaints about my garage workshop have diminished.

Christos
1st August 2014, 07:50 PM
Another great run of turned handles.

artful bodger
1st August 2014, 08:48 PM
Ah Interesting. I think architects get a bit of kudos from designing and making furniture. (Not that they actually "make" the furniture. The actual people who do the making are invisible.)

Hi Tea lady. You are quite right. There is a problematic situation going on with this sort of work.However, as far as the door handles go, I can live with it as the hourly rate I get for them is better than I would get from say...turning bowls and selling them through a gallery, or for the most part making fancy chairs or other bits of furniture and selling through a 3rd party.
There is a similar problematic situation going on in the art world where you get big name and really big dollar artists who just come up with an idea and then get/pay skilled people to make the artwork. Artist pays the makers then charges outrageous prices for the artwork. Seems a bit like cheating to me, however it all is legitimate apparently. Far as I can tell it started off with an artist by the name of Duchamp who nearly 100 years ago entered a male urinal in a big art exhibition. He did not make the urinal but according to his blurb that was of no importance! google it if you haven't heard of the bloke. Either way it sure opened a can o worms.