Why do people like to make things? If you make things, why did you start?

I make things to “scratch an itch.” If the results are pleasing, helpful, taste good, or delightful in some way, I am soothed. Sometimes the only benefit is the experience of the doing. Skills are improved with practice; the loaves of bread I make today are consistently good, simply because I have been making the same recipe for years, and I bake it once or twice a month.

I learned to love making things long before I ever knew what being an artist meant. For me, it all started with drawing. As a child, drawing was simply something we all did, for entertainment or self expression. If we had to sit through a long service in church, we used the pew as a desk and drew pictures.

“Access to tools” is what it used to say on the Whole Earth Catalog, and fundamentally that is all that seems to be necessary for homo faber. I did go to art school, and studied in a few other craft traditions; picture framing, furniture making, guitar building. But fixing things, building things, cooking things, or growing things also took place outside of the context of “career.”

The main motivation is to understand things on a deeper level. Whether it is splitting the case of your 1200cc VW engine, or installing BSD, there is a need to get it done (“how will I get my car back home unless I replace the spun bearings?” or “I want to setup a web server at home”) coupled with curiosity. Making things can be a wonderful way to be both productive and to learn new things, become more skillful and gain a richer understanding of something. On an economic level, turning an old file into a plane iron makes no sense at all. Making woodworking planes at all is not very economical, but the experience is priceless. The end result will be “tools” that are simply available no other way: knowledge and understanding.