I’ve been doing quite a lot for the North Holland Archives the last couple of years (see: Women in the Resistance and Johan Enschede: Printer of Value). But I hadn’t expected to do any sculptural work for them. Yet when they asked if I knew anyone who could upgrade their door hardware from their legacy Formica to something more substantial, I volunteered myself.
I recreated the Archive’s logo in 3D and produced it in bronze, and these panels were just recently installed as new door handles. The process was simple enough: I made a 3D model in the computer based on photographs of the original hardware and of the archive logo. Then I had this model printed with a 3D printer. This functioned as the matrix model for a bronze foundry (Kemner in the town of Cuijk) which cast them in fine sand. Overall we are very pleased with the results.