Portfolio Archives

Architects Seth McDowell and Rychiee Espinosa founded their practice mcdowellespinosa in 2010 with the goal of transforming “waste, excess, and the ordinary into new spatial and material realities.” In 2015, they were selected os one of the six winners of the the prestigious Architectural League Prize. Winners of the prize present their work in lectures […]

Through her Brooklyn-based studio AVANDI, Ariane van Dievoet designs and manufactures furniture, home goods and jewelry “inspired by sustainable solutions and modular systems.” According to Ariane, her designs are “honest and sophisticated” which she attributes to her Belgian roots. We were asked to fabricate a few elements for her studio using our laser cutting and […]

For their inaugural design conference “Object Culture” held in Brooklyn, we were asked by Core77 to fabricate a small item that would be given out to conference attendees. Given the rough outline of some sort of small token or poker chip incorporating the Core77 logo, we set about producing prototypes using a variety of techniques […]

Lawn darts. If you are old enough to remember them, you are probably aware of why the sharp-tipped projectile toys were banned from sale in the United States in the 1980s. Mostly relegated to memory and horror stories, countless dusty sets surely linger within the garages of those who wanted the Consumer Product Safety Commission […]

The parts for this laser cutting project were some of the tiniest pieces we have ever made. Fabricated for researchers at the NYU Center for Neural Science, the “footplates” are one small component used in their work on the impact of hearing loss on auditory processing and perception. In order to fabricate such small parts […]

After covering the walls of our office with pegboard panels to hold materials and tools, we decided to use the remaining material for our sign. We were able to laser cut our logo from the 1/4″ pegboard, which was backed with a sheet of 1/8″ orange acrylic. We saved both the letters and the loose […]

Jewelry designer Satoko Nobe had us laser cut a variety of tiny acrylic parts that she uses in the mold-making process prior to casting her jewelry. The precision of the laser cutter allowed her to achieve a level of intricacy in this particular design that would have been extremely time-consuming to produce by hand. The […]

For our own business cards we knew we wanted to incorporate laser cutting to quickly communicate the type of work we do in a memorable way. We selected a variety of simple hand tools as the laser cut elements of the card to convey the idea of fabrication, and to serve as a nice contrast […]

The Urban-est was designed by Snohetta as a nest/birdhouse that could fit within the hollows of a standard masonry block. The prototype was developed for the Design Trust for Public Space’s 2009 Annual Benefit auction. The exterior surface was comprised of laser-cut 1/8″ birch and acrylic layers built up into a topography creating perches and […]

This project was the result of a cross-disciplinary studio based on the relationship between music and architecture. György Ligeti’s “Concerto for Violin and Orchestra” served as the inspiration for the design of the building. While incorporating many themes from Ligeti’s Concerto, the project focuses on the distinction between the sounds of the violin and the […]

For her 2010 holiday card, Carrie Hamilton of Kismet Design produced a piece that cleverly uses a variety of laser cutting techniques. The two-sided design overlays a series of laser cut openings in the word “XMAS” to form part of the roman numeral MMX for 2010 on the reverse surface. The non-overlapping portions of the […]

This model was laser cut and assembled for a client in need of a topographic site model. The drawings for the model were provided by the client as a Rhino file with the sections cut through a three-dimensional model. These layers were each cut from sheets of 0.022″ thick recycled chipboard and built up on […]

In order to customize the silver sleeves that surround the box protecting the champagne bottle, Dom Pérignon chose to laser cut and engrave text for events. Once a particular message and font was chosen, we carefully inserted tabs into the artwork to hold the letters in place. A special jig was produced to align and […]

French artist Koralie created a series of intricate laser cut and engraved wood and paper figures for an exhibition of her work. The pieces draw on a variety of influences, incorporating iconography from a wide array of cultures. The gallery below shows the laser cut and engraved bass wood pieces. The intricacy of these pieces […]

French artist Koralie created a series of intricate laser cut and engraved wood and paper figures for an exhibition of her work. The pieces draw on a variety of influences, incorporating iconography from a wide array of cultures. The gallery below shows the wings which were laser cut from a wide variety of papers, and […]

Paper Engineer Teen Liu creates three-dimensional pop-up art in a wide variety of materials and scales—from greeting cards to full-scale theatrical sets and installation pieces. For this piece, Teen was working on a prototype for a prehistoric pop-up with fluorescent details. All images courtesy of Teen Liu.            

Designer Danika Faiola produces a wide range of jewlery primarily from acrylic sheet stock. The pieces are laser cut and engraved in a variety of fluorescent, mirrored and colored acrylic sheets. The final assembly of the pieces was done by the designer. Images provided courtesy of Danika Faiola.               […]

Artist Ingrid Burrington wanted to create a puzzle where the pieces were made up of the more than 200 neighborhoods in Baltimore. She used GIS data to generate the intricately bordered shapes which were then labeled with the name of each neighborhood. She wanted to create a more durable version of a previous iteration of […]

Todd Bailey is an engineer specializing in hardware-based electronics design, but the more apt and exciting description is seen in the header atop his website: “analog and embedded systems wizardy”. One output of this wizardry is the digital sampler he created and named “Where’s the Party At?”. The enclosures for the kits are made from […]

Ismael Baíz is a professional musician who handcrafts drums here in New York City through his company, Maelo Drums. Baíz uses a wide variety of different woods for his drums, selecting the material based on the needs of the musicians who will be performing with them. The nameplates for his drums were laser engraved with […]

The Australian electro-punk band Angelspit produced a wide variety of laser cut and engraved pieces for their band’s collection of jewelry and assorted merchandise. While a large portion of the intricate works were cut from solid-colored acrylic, we introduced them to some multi-colored composite materials which allowed them to design & create pieces making use […]

Designer Tara Hogan, of Ink + Wit, uses a variety of natural and recycled materials throughout her design work. For this project, Hogan laser engraved a series of her animal designs into wool felt and bristol board. Lighter shades were chosen for both the felt and the bristol in order to allow the dark laser […]

Designer Amrita Takhar used pieces of found plastic in the creation of this set of jewelry pieces she designed. The plastic was salvaged from various automobile parts—reflectors, tail light covers, etc. The unusual shapes were each individually cut from the odd shapes of plastic, in locations identified by Takhar. The cut pieces were then finished […]

Brooklyn-based furniture manufacturer olollo, inc. designed a series of custom tables incorporating laser cut wood veneer and mother-of-pearl inlay pieces. The mother-of-pearl portions of the table were cut from tiles made up of thin layers of capiz shells. After a series of tests, a system was devised for laser cutting the unusual material to the […]

Todd Bailey is an engineer specializing in hardware-based electronics design, but the more apt and exciting description is seen in the header atop his website: “analog and embedded systems wizardy”. One output of this wizardry is the digital sampler he created and named “Where’s the Party At?”. The enclosures for the kits are made from […]

Artist Debra Hampton created these intricate cut-paper silhouettes as an insert for a publication including her work. The design was translated into a vector format in Illustrator and then laser cut from a single sheet of paper. The last image below shows the pieces left behind in the laser cutter after the work was lifted […]

Artist Lillian Ball needed a business card to help promote WATERWASH®, a series of projects she has undertaken to help improve water quality and storm water remediation, as well as restore wetlands areas. She provided a simple hand-drawn wave graphic that was then converted into a vector for laser etching on the surface of the […]

This project set out to explore the possibilities of glass slumping, culminating in a full-scale installation of slumped glass panels at Columbia University.

Given the rapidly increasing population of New York City and the lack of space for new (and affordable) housing units, there is a need to either increase density within the boroughs or risk losing residents to the surrounding region. One proposal put forward by the Mayor’s office suggests filling in the under-utilized land within current […]

Inspired by the 16th-century wattle & daub building technique, our team produced a sustainable curtain wall panel system combining modern and medieval construction methods. The pre-fabricated frames are filled on site with waste from the building process. Sawdust, wood chips, and other scraps are mixed in with a binding agent to form the daub. This […]