Thanks for noticing!
If you clicked on that link it was either a stroke of good luck or genuine curiosity.
Either way, welcome to the Journal. This is where I go into an uncomfortable amount of detail about… all of it.
If you’d like to return to the homepage just click this button, and think twice before clicking random links on private websites.
This website is itself a long standing multi year project, that first came to exist in 2018 or so. I was still a budding craftsperson and some of the works in the Journal are from my archive, of old projects done for early clients and personal projects.
Insert pics here of old projects ))
My goal with my craft is to develop continuously over time; I am inspired by artisans and crafts folk all around the world who refine and hone their techniques each day. It has taken me 8 years or more to finally reach a place where I am proud to put my own name on the things I make.
The images here tell a story, a slow and meandering path towards where I am today.
process shot with me in it? ))
After a degree in Economics, I briefly took a detour to explore Fine Art and Portraiture, and Painting. Before that, was a year long detour into Integrative Medicine and Acupuncture. I am a little scattered all over the place, and I don’t mind.
Paintings, other images ))
I continue to enjoy studying and practicing the Tarot, in pursuit of my goal to paint a Tarot deck of my own design and metaphysical flavour.
Tarot that have been finished ))
Learning woodworking in my free time has given me a deeper appreciation for natural materials, and I hope to one day offer more mixed media products, as I hone my skills with the chisel and saw.
Some tools))
Blacksmithing and blade-smithing are fantasies that occasionally draw me into their grasp, and I have made quite a few little knives for myself, each designed for a specific task in my craft.
Knives laid out images. ))
I appreciate great craftsmanship but I see it dying, and often too expensive for me to afford. Those who can afford it at retail prices are often too shallow to appreciate it.
I know where the issue lies: in the cost of living. In places where the labour is cheapest, the skill is exploited for corporate profit by huge companies, and the material is sourced to be the cheapest and most “consumer friendly”. The consumers of retail luxury of all categories are detached and distant from the labour that makes it, and spends money to appeal to the tastes of people they want to impress. Or for the camera and the social media gaze, I only know that the vast majority who purchase Hermes bags or Ferragamo shoes or countless other consumer goods, they are mismatched. The ones who have the mindset to use the luxury quality bag for a lifetime would be too poor to buy it, and the one who can afford it can often afford many, and cares more about the marketing fluff than the material stuff.
In places like Europe where labour is expensive, the prices are jacked up even more by inflated costs of living from over-financialized capital greed that needs to get a cut of every single transaction. Everything is half-assed, or some corner is always cut for the sake of a nameless figurehead with more zeros at the end of their bank statement.
Most artisans live simply: I believe it is in our nature; When one possesses the power to make form from imagination and offer it to others, they often desire on behalf of others too.
I tire of it.
I chose to move from Singapore to Canada, and then to Vietnam. I learned that for my products to be competitive and affordable, the labour needed to cheap. And the only way for me to make my labour cheap is to have a low cost of living.
Since I am the labour, it meant living in a place that respects the importance of affordable living, of accessible healthy meals and a natural lifestyle. Of simple wants and needs fulfilled with little friction. In this aspect, Da Lat, Vietnam, has been a wonderful oasis to live in. Enough city to be convenient, enough countryside to stay grounded.
All around the world we face issues too many to name, and my only solace is my craft.
In my craft I can make a living exploring the fields of engineering, architecture, design, philosophy, art, web design and UI/UX and so much more, while providing a product that very quietly signals to the world: “bullshit won’t cut it anymore.”