Behind the Slides, our ongoing feature, is where we meet up with an artist who presented at a PechaKucha event and find out the deeper story beneath the images they chose to portray.

Noah Bly is a blacksmith artist who also works as an auto mechanic with his father. He began his blacksmith career by taking classes at Haystack Mountain School of Crafts in Deer Isle. After six years, he still considers himself an apprentice and takes as many classes he can in metalwork and joinery. He makes his own tools and particularly loves blades, axes and swords.

Note: The slides appear in the right column. Click on the photos to match them with the actual slide notes (in italics). Beneath the slide notes will be the deeper story.

Shop

This is the shop I built after four years of clowning around with a crude setup. The shop was built with a few things in mind. Garden shed to the right, woodshed to the left. The stone section is the metal shop. The stone was gathered from the property.

The shop is 30-by-24-feet and was the first time I built a shed. I forged the hinges on the front and all of the hardware for all of the windows.

Techniques

I chose to include this slide because it shows techniques that are independent to blacksmithing. I've noticed a lot of people think metal can only be bolted or welded. Not so. I thought people might learn a little something from this one.

I initially made this slide for Pecha Kucha just to show people how the techniques work, thinking I’d have time to explain them all, but I only had 20 seconds. The technique I probably use the most is the the slitting and drifting technique, which makes a hole in something without losing any material. As you’ll see from the gates below, it was all put together with the slitting and drifting technique.

Blades and Axes

I initially got into blacksmithing with an interest in edged weapons. I soon found that I enjoyed making anything out of metal. Whether it be some cooking implements for mother or a chandelier for a customer.

I use the sword a lot to clear out all the bushes down by the driveway. A buddy of mine was driving by last fall and said he saw me, said it looked like a lot of fun.

Wood rack

This is a relatively basic frame but joining metal with traditional techniques. Makes it more unique. People often say blacksmithing is a dying art, and it is to a degree, because it takes a lot longer to forge a mortise and tenon then to weld something.

Today, there are so many cheaper ways to do build stuff, but can’t duplicate the aesthetics of the traditional joining and the shape of the metal.

Gates against stone

These were made with a lot of traditional techniques I had been practicing on smaller projects. It was very difficult to include them all in something where they all had to work together and come out square and not twisted. Blacksmithing is not machining; when closing up a mortise and tenon, chances are pretty good it won't be perfect. It's knowing how to correct it that’s tricky.

These gates go in front of our wood stove. I put them there to keep the kids away from it. But, now that those gates are there, they see it as a jungle gym.

Railings

These were the most time-consuming railings I’ve done. I included these because they’re so far from anything I imagined myself doing 10 years ago when I first started making crude throwing knives from old car parts.

These took about 100 hours to make. If I were to say something to my younger self 10 years ago, I’d say, keep going, you’ll be able to work up the skills to this level.

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com