Happy Chinese New Year!Workers at the Hampton factory in Shanghai are off until the end of February, for the traditional Chinese New Year's celebration. Xīnnián kuàilè. So in the meantime we will revisit some of the action from our December trip to Shanghai. If you are a Hawaii fan like we are you know sea turtles are very common there. There are trips so you can go see them in the water, even swim with them. Tale of the TurtlesWhen I first saw this BoatTEST video on Youtube, starring hull #10 of our series, I got an idea. Here Steve is pointing out that the factory can "water jet cut" marble and granite. In this case they installed a stainless trim piece. So I asked the factory if it would be possible to cut out granite in the shape of sea turtles? My idea was to have sea turtles in the galley floor! They said they thought so, if I could come up with a design they would let me know or sure. They needed a full size PDF to put into their CAD software, which would then go into the CNC cutter. I located an artist in Hawaii that had done some similar work: www.thomasdeir.com/ Thomas asked me to phone him, which I did. We had a lovely phone call and he wanted to know my thoughts, my motivations. Wanted to know "why Mahalo" and "what are you thankful for?" I was very intrigued, he wasn't just looking for the work & commission. He wanted to know WHO he was doing the work for and WHY. After speaking with him I'd say we are probably kindred spirits (hey, we have both flown ultralights!). Thomas asked if I could provide a scale drawing of the area, as well as some type of "concept drawing" for him to go on. So here's my funny little drawing I did in Power Point. I only show one baby, but my idea was always a mama and two babies. I had it in my head that we would use three different stones, one for the background (the sea) and two for the turtles. Thomas did a rough drawing of the mama turtle, and also indicated he thought it would be better to just use one stone. I submitted this to the factory and they said "no problem." Also, separately they told me they were very excited about the turtles: "Turtles symbol of long life in China!" Thomas then came up with this final drawing, which I was thrilled with. I submitted to the factory. While we were in Shanghai we went to a stone yard to pick out our granite and marble selections. I'll show you that in tomorrow's post. But I don't want to leave you hanging, so here is the finished floor: Turtles swimming in the sea! How magical is that?
1 Comment
3/6/2018 09:40:27 am
Beautiful Bob! It came out just gorgeous! I'm very impressed with the whole project and the people behind it! Thank you for sharing!
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