New Square Shades!

This week I’ve been trying out different square shade ideas for our Andon lamp base.

One is a frame which transparent acrylic rectangles slide into to allow you to have engravings on the acrylic so it can be customised but also lets lots of light through so its useful as well as cool and customisable. I still need to add a set of legs to hold it on the base and a top to hold the acrylic in place but it looks cool so I’m happy to keep working on this design to get it to a working product.

Fig 1. Engraved lamp shade for square Andon lamp base

The second shade idea is buildings because the square bases look like they belong to houses in my head. So it made me think of apartment buildings but I’d also like to make one look like a little cottage, but that’s a job for next week. The windows of the apartment building are transparent acrylic windows so you can slide different colours of acrylic in to have different coloured windows. You could also engrave (using the laser) or just use a sharpie or paint pen and freehand draw on the windows different scenes like a cat in a window, or a planter box….etc, etc. I’ve found the acrylic is a bit of a tight fit in-between the 2 squares which are the windows so I’ll need to revise the inner box in Onshape and then try reprinting the inner box and see if its a better fit.

Fig 2. Apartment building lamp shade for Andon lamp base

I designed the 3D models of the shades in Onshape then printed them on the 3D printer. I also used Onshape to create sketches of the acrylic shapes for the shades. In Onshape you can download sketches as drawings and then import them into Beam Studio which we use for our Flux HEXA laser cutter. You can directly create images in Beam Studio but if you want an exact size its easier to create them in a drawing package like Onshape plus its easy to revise/adjust dimensions in Onshape if you made something fit a bit tight then export the sketch as a drawing again and then import into Beam Studio again, and try cutting it with the laser. There is lots of fine tuning involved in creating prototypes so its helpful to have tools that make this iteration process quick. Below is a little video for you to see me trying out the design ideas.

The classic Andon shade and my new ideas for square shades!

Next week I’ll show you some photos of the finished square shades. I like both the new square designs so I’ll keep working on both. Am keen to show you the new designs but all lit up, i.e. with the lamp base running.

Then all I need to do is photograph them, add them into the on-line shop (i.e. argue with Squarespace then eventually get it right), work on social media designs in Canva, publicise the new shades on social media (Facebook, Instagram, possibly LinkedIn if it seems serious enough), then try to sell them to someone(s). Its harder work than I expected to create products end to end and also to do all the marketing and sales, its not as easy as just buying a 3D printer and pressing print. So today (and everyday in my head) I’m sending RESPECT to all those in design and production and marketing and retail, something you make look smooth and effortless in your marketing involves a lot of hard graft behind the scenes. I’d encourage you to shop local this Christmas and shop small, so the people who wear lots of job hats get some joy this Christmas, because every sale is exciting when you’re so connected to the whole process of creating and selling products.