Carl West

Mr. West discovered smithing in the mid-70's and has been doing it off and on since. "Whenever my landlord has failed to prohibit it, I've had a forge set up." He earned a BFA in Sculpture and Metalcraft at Carnegie-Mellon University in Pittsburgh. During those summers he worked with Warren Swanson, a blacksmith in West Newfield, Maine. "I learned a lot with Warren: how to run a fire, how the metal moves under the hammer, how to make a hundred fireplace pokers in a day..." Since then he has been an armorer, type designer, graphic artist, multmedia programmer, and watch and jewelry repairman.  "The whole time I was doing that other stuff," says West, "the hot iron kept calling to me. It's good to get back to the hammer and be sharing the joys of blacksmithing with others."