DIY Retail Displays This article was posted on Thursday, 7th March 2019

In my day job, I have a workwear business where we sell and customise workwear. I needed some new displays for the shop floor.

I had seen a really nice shop/production space in the US and they had used an old ladder as a clothes display, and I'm not sure whether they had come up with the idea or whether it came elsewhere, but I robbed it completely, but glad to give credit to No Matter What Apparel for the idea.

I actually have an old wooden ESB ladder but I only have one and it has been outside for a good few years, so I decided to make them. The build was pretty straightforward, shaping the pieces of the ladder, gluing and nailing them together and then a rough paint job. I started with a set of two, but I liked them so much, I built two more a few months later. You can see this jump in the video. The second set I painted black as the walls in my shop are grey and the other ladders, being grey, blended in with the wall.

These ladders were installed before Christmas, I just have been super slow in getting videos done. I was going to do a talking head vid, but I just am too busy with many different things at the moment. I'm also planning a redesign of the shop, and I want to do a video series on that, so I have this video from before Christmas, as well as another in the works, which I want to publish before the new shop layout.

Visit The Workwear Department website, as well as our online shop The Work Shop.

Trampoline Steps This article was posted on Tuesday, 11th December 2018

Over the summer, I made some a platform and steps to keep my kids from falling out of the trampoline.

My youngest child was also fond of diving head first off the trampoline, so saved a hospital trip or two. I used chunky treated timber with half lap joints and decking for the platform.

I think I used one 4.8m (16ft) of treated 100x150mm (4"x6" inch) post, two 16ft decking lengths and some 2"x6" that I had lying around.

It's now December when I finally get around to editing and posting this and I think it should survive the winter no problem. I might add some 'feet' under the timber that is touching the ground as it will rot from the ground up in no time. I'm thinking some rubber or foam matting up on flat stones or pavers. Maybe.

I'll have another video up, sooner rather than later.

 

Customised Hultafors Axe Handle This article was posted on Thursday, 7th June 2018

I got this Hultafors axe at Christmas and, with its hand-forged head, it's a beaut. With that, I wanted to make it my own with some custom handle graphics. 

Initially I had the idea of doing a 'Book of Kells'-type knotwork design, but I decided to go with a more appropriate Hickory leaf. Weeding the vinyl stencil was an absolute nightmare.

This video took far too long to produce- talking to a camera is pretty gack, so I think I might've procrastinated over finishing this one. Look out for my next video, sooner rather than later. 

Kindling Box This article was posted on Sunday, 1st April 2018

I made a pair of wooden crates to store kindling in my home. Like most people in Ireland, burning wood is one of the main sources of heat in our house, and a continuous supply of kindling is needed, to get the fire going.

The process is detailed in the video, I did a narrated build as I lost some footage due to a hard disk crash, so it wouldn't have made sense without explanation. It's really uncomfortable having to edit footage of yourself talking to the camera. I spent more time trying to hide the cuts where I removed the 'Ummms' and pauses as I tried to think what happened next.

This should've been a simple project, but I went back and forth with how I was going to do certain aspects. I then rough cut the whole process, simplifying it, but then lost the rough cut in the crash. So I could not remember the order of processes or which parts were still relevant.

I never had a disk crash where I lost stuff, but it sucks. It was a Seagate disk and was so new when it crashed, that the back up hadn't been completed.

A couple of features I'm really happy with- the painted decals, they were a nightmare to do, due to a combination of dodgy vinyl and dodgy paint, but looked great when finished. The other feature is the handles, they're functional, look great and were relatively easy to do. I had seen this style of handle in another YouTube video somewhere but after I published the video, I found a photo on Instagram of some vintage crates (handle on Remington crate, top left)-

I'd love to know how those handles were cut in a production environment, they look a little rough, and not rough from years of use, they look as if they're rough-cut. I love old crates.

Anyway, I have another video in the works, should be out soon.

It was ten years ago today This article was posted on Wednesday, 28th March 2018

On March 28th 2008, I started this website.

I started my life as a self-employed web designer January 1st, 2008, and I thought that my path was Ruby on Rails. So I set about learning Rails (it was the ultimate in cool tech at the time) by creating a blog. It didn't take long to do, and my first post was about my side-project, screenprinting, specifically my Robot print. I have a whole Flickr album (remember Flickr?) about it.

As far as I can remember, I set up the Rails project on a Rails-specific hosting account, and worked fine until the hosting company updated their Rails install and the website went kaput. I think it lasted two weeks, before the update. I then put together a Wordpress site, stuck it on johnrainsford.com and reposted the first few posts from the previous site.

Ironically, the first post is at a time when I was a full-time web designer and occasional screen printer. Ten years later I am a full-time screen printer (amongst other things) and an occasional web designer.

The robot print is still around, there is a framed printed in my boy's room, who was not even a gleam in my eye ten years ago.

Here's to another ten.

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