Blacksmithing shapes sophistication from scratch

Hundreds of years ago, blacksmiths were rugged men of medieval villages and kingdoms responsible for making finely crafted weaponry for knights and kings in armor. Blacksmiths worked with nothing in the way of tools except fireplaces, stone sharpening wheels, hammers, anvils and their soot-covered bare hands. While more advanced technology has made its way into blacksmithing, the course of labor hasn't changed much itself.

And neither has the lack of cleanliness.

When working with metals for custom jobs, blacksmiths and metalsmiths start work with taking measurements and making finely detailed sketches drawn to scale before getting to work with the process of tediously hammering, welding and grinding the metals into shape.

According to Transit Forge owner and operator Greg Gehner, 34, being a blacksmith doesn't entail a clean work space.

"A lot of what I do in my work involves welding and grinding," Gehner said. "Grinding is one of the dirtier parts of my job. You're basically using an abrasive wheel that wears down the steel, so that it slings particles of abrasive steel all over the shop and your clothes."

Blacksmiths like Gehner take custom orders from customers to make finer pieces of artisanship, but mainly work with mild, off-the-shelf steel to create products such as fences, panels and even commemorative plaques.

For metalsmiths such as assistant metalsmithing professor Sean Macmillan, 32, the types of metal more commonly worked with are varied but usually more valuable.

"In my own professional work, I usually work with copper and steel, but if I'm making something specific for somebody, such as jewelry, I really run the gambit," he said. "I work with silver, gold, brass, platinum, gold, diamonds, you name it. It really all depends on what specific things people ask me to do for them."

Because metals such as gold and silver come with an extremely high price tag, Macmillan said he has to be very careful with the handling of precious metals.

"The thing about working with gold is that you have to be very clean and organized," he said. "You have to be careful because your dirt is very expensive. If you just brush a pile of gold dust into the trash can, you just basically threw away approximately $60 to $100."

When metalsmiths finish working with copper, the final product is polished and dirt-free. But the process workers go through to get copper products in that appearance is anything but that.

"A lot of times when you're working on a silver piece, you're basically handling raw copper all day, so when you come home, your hands are green from the copper dust." Macmillan said. "I like to take solace in the fact that when I tell my wife I'm going to the studio, she doesn't worry about me because I come home with my hands green and smelling like copper, so she knows I'm not hanging out at the Brewery or elsewhere."

With work in metal shops, the accumulation of particles all over the shop is not limited to working with the metals themselves. According to Gehner, other supplies have caused his shop to get very filthy at one time or another.

"One additional process of working as a blacksmith, on occasion, is working with coal," he said. "I haven't had a coal forge in a while, but handling coal comes up at times. As a blacksmith, I actually heat the steel in a coal fire before working with it. So because of the coal burning, soot does gather very quickly across the shop. In terms of just how dirty [the shop] gets, it's like a coal plant but on a smaller scale."

To become a blacksmith or a metalsmith, one must complete several years of higher education involving hands-on experience and training. According to Gehner, being a blacksmith doesn't become easy even after years of training.

"Being a blacksmith is most definitely a technical job," he said. "[Metalsmithing] involves a lot of work with your hands, so it takes quite a while to develop the skills to do work on the job, especially with forging and welding. [Blacksmiths] may have better tools to work with, but since you're still hammering metal with your hands, nothing much has changed. It's still a very physical job.