Intro to Fabrication: Week 3

Assignment

This week’s assignment: laser cut two of the same thing:

One must be small
One must be big (1 ft. x 1 ft.)

Materials

I’ve already laser cut acrylic, wood, and cardboard for previous projects, so I wanted to try using a new material. Inspired by thick felt trivets I’ve seen online, I wanted to experiment with making my own. I purchased a piece of 5mm thick merino wool felt from a shop on Etsy and figured I could cut a coaster as my smaller piece, and a trivet as my larger piece.

As for the design of the vector cut itself, I thought of this project as a chance to prototype and make my own interpretation of an idea my mom has shared with me – making a trivet in the shape of the Philippines. What I envisioned: create a whole set of trivets in the shape of individual islands of the Philippines that could be the base for a whole spread of dishes on a table. (And if I were to take this idea even further, I’d put a regional dish on that island’s trivet.)

Process

For this assignment, I chose to work with the shape of Leyte, the island in the Visayas region of the Philippines where my maternal grandparents are from. I tested out the scale of the island as a trivet and coaster with cardboard, and from there, moved on to attempting the cut on the wool felt. It was tougher than I thought. I had to do multiple passes with the laser cutter, and most of the thick felt still wasn’t cut all the way through. The edges were also darkening and the felt was developing a burnt hair scent. I ended up having to cut parts of the outline with a utility knife and cleaned up some portions with scissors.

The cardboard pieces I laser cut to test out the size.

Result

I would really love to nail the settings for the wool. I still have some wool left over to experiment and figure out the right power and speed settings that ideally would not burn the felt. The other thing I need to resolve about these pieces is the smell. I might try putting these in the freezer to remove the odor.