A Late Polish

When Christian Leyk is going to his garage to polish some metal it’s usually car parts that end up shiny. Today however it was a different story.

“I should start by telling a little anecdote from the first semester at university. As part of learning model building were given the tasks to build a set of salad servers in wood and a carving knife and fork in metal. To make things more interesting for the young aspiring designers we were even allowed to do them to our own designs. Obviously, the professor had to approve the plans; the idea was that whatever we wanted to do would involve the right variety of model building tasks and skills to make it a meaningful exercise. But then again, it was a creative project, so we had to ‘sell’ it, too!

With youthful exuberance and my usual madness I developed a dismountable carving set, a little bit inspired by the coolness of the assassin’s briefcase we often see in the movies (and maybe you remember that this theme was picked up in the villain’s sword in ‘Highlander’, too). I argued that men are essentially boys and that my carvers would translate the Lego set into the world of the grown-ups. My professor approved the design, but he commented that I was the first student ever who caused him enough despair for him to tear his hair in public.

The set was originally done in a satin finish to underline it’s functional character. However, when I looked at it the other day I not only realised that it was in need of some tlc, but that my decision back then was wrong. It was just asking to get a proper polish. I think like this my professor would have liked it more.”