Meet the machine parts salesman who turned a brake rotor into a lamp and never looked back
It might be hard to envision a brake rotor like this one as part of a lamp, but lamp-maker Ken Blaisdell considers it a perfect base. (DmitryPoch via Depositphotos/)As an industrial salesman, Ken Blaisdell found himself looking for an artistic outlet that would balance out his long drives selling sensors, cylinders, valves, and other machine parts to quarries and light manufacturing companies across New England. Then, in the early 1990s, he had a eureka moment.With access to his company’s machine shop, the now-73-year-old recalls thinking, “‘I should be able to make something,’ and lamps seemed like something that almost anyone could do.” So, he asked one of the machinists to teach him how to use the workshop’s machinery (lathes, saws, and grinding and welding equipment)—everything he thought he’d need to create the lamps he’d imagined.Each day, after driving his routes, and after the machine work room had closed for the...