Ken and Diana Swallow are a husband and wife creative team based in Tampa, who will be joining us this year at the Tampa Bay Mini Maker Faire with their awesome creations from their Upcycled Studio. Ken and Diana took a little time to share a bit about their work and creative vision with us here at TBMMF.
TBMMF: So what’s Upcycled Studio?
Upcyled Studio: Ken creates upcycled mixed media assemblage sculpture
using broken electronics, vintage items and found objects. Diana has a passion for metalsmithing and jewelry design and incorporates found objects in her works. Individually we’ve created an online following and fan base, Ken under the name
KenBots and Diana under
Diana Swallow Designs. Together we participate in local art shows under the name
Upcycled Studio. While different, our work shares the similar theme of upcycling and comes together beautifully at our shows.
TBMMF : What got you started?
Diana: Ken and I both started our artistic endeavors at a very young age. Ken took apart his grandmothers radio to see how it worked and has been taking things apart and putting them back together ever since. His math and science test scores caught the eye of a recruiter when he was in high school and was offered an apprenticeship in electronics, from there they sent him to university for all things computer related. He has been using spare parts to create sculptures for friends and colleagues for nearly 40 years, a few years ago when he was laid off from a job he found he had time on his hands and started tinkering again.
I started creating things from anything I could get my hands on from a very young age, scraps of fabric and yarn from my mother sparked my creativity. My dad had a construction company and on the weekends I’d watch him weld and fabricate things from metal. As an adult I worked for many years in graphic design and after deciding to change career paths a few times, I found myself in a metalsmthing class using those artistic skills and turning jewelry designs that had been in my head for years into actual jewelry.
One day while helping Ken sort through parts I noticed some interesting pieces:
gears, strips of aluminum, saxophone keys and more. Instantly she knew these all had jewelry potential. Combining fabrication skills I learned in metalsmithing I started created upcycled jewelry. Ken was approached by the organizers for the
Orlando Mini Maker Faire and asked him to participate so in May of 2012 we packed up the car with our creations and headed to Orlando to see what people would think. The positive feedback was overwhelming. We’ve done about seven or eight shows locally since, and are selling online worldwide.
TBMMF: What keeps you going?
Diana: We motivate each other. We love what we do. Hearing positive feedback. We believe in recycling and upcycling. Yes some stuff is junk but a lot of it still has life.
TBMMF: What’s your favorite part of a build?
Diana: For both of us its seeing the design in our head come together as a real object we can touch with our hands.
TBMMF: What’s your favorite building material?
Diana: For Ken its brass, for me gemstones and gears.
TBMMF: What would you tell other wannabe Makers who might think they don’t have any new ideas?
Diana : Design is all around you, inspiration is all around you, don’t try to copy something else is doing, put your own spin on it. Trying to copy what someone else has done exactly will lead to frustration. Look at shapes you see in nature or what you’ve seen on TV and think about new ways something like that could work. You don’t know what you can do until you try, start small and take it from there.
TBMMF: What are you looking forward to at the Tampa Bay Mini Maker Faire?
Diana: One of our favorite parts of displaying our work has been the light we see in peoples eyes when they recognize something they’ve seen before and seeing it used in a new way. When they see something that they have at home or threw away because they thought it was junk and then realize that what they see as junk, we see as art. We plan on having some parts on display on our table for people to come by and try to identify. Its always fun to see parents bring their kids over and tell them what things are from. Sometimes they get it right, sometimes they get it wrong but its a learning process and a lot of fun.
TBMMF: Anything else you’d like to share?
Diana: Before you throw something away, think about other uses it might have. Keeping things out of landfills benefits us all.
Ken: Is it simply junk or items that were allocated to the landfills and junk yards? Its all about transforming parts of discarded items into something original: in effect breathing new life into them and having fun while doing it.
You can meet Diana and Ken in person at Tampa Bay Mini Maker Faire, and see those transformations firsthand. Thanks, Upcycled Studio, for giving us an inside look at your life and art!
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