I have always loved making things as a kid (the catalyst being the glue gun my grandma got for me when I was 5 and the numerous cardboard boxes my mom brought home from work as building material, boy she sure saved money on toys because I was making my own!). This continued into high school when I joined the robotics team (VEX, FRC). As a student on the high school robotics team we got our asses kicked by teams with machine shops. Their glamourous shiny machines, precision machined aluminum components, powder-coated frames. Glorious. I wanted to learn how to make cool stuff like them. So before I even finished high school I applied for a student job as a machine shop assistant at the local university. Not long after that the first product I designed was an intricate pen with aviation inspired features which debuted on Kickstarter in 2013. Since then I went on to complete two engineering degrees, worked for a DOD contractor doing really cool stuff, then took the jump to return back to the world of machining. 

Why Mejiro?

​

There's a bit of a backstory to this. I was about 10 when I left my grandparents house while visiting, my mom asked if I had given a hug to my grandpa (I always hugged my grandma) and I shrugged it off, didn't want to go all the way back upstairs and thought "next time" I can wave to him from the street anyhow. Well, next time didn't come. He died suddenly soon after and I realized at that point there was a serious life lesson to be learned here. I spent the next 10 years making it a point to make spending what time I could with my grandma a priority. She was quite the social butterfly, always eager to make friends, extremely funny when she had to dish out some hard truth. She would often say she would come back as a mejiro. I'm not sure if I believe in any of that stuff, but I think she would be pleased to see the work I put so much effort into named in her memory.