Concertina

Contributors:
Matthew Hynam, Thom Gorst

A collaborative project between Matthew Hynam and Dr Thom Gorst. Thom is a painter and history of architecture lecturer. He also plays the concertina for the Bathampton Morris Men who dance in the Cotswold tradition.

The project sees the restoration and enhancement of a 26 button Lachenal concertina that has had its endplates damaged after being dropped. The damage to the endplates requires them to be replaced and provides the opportunity to modify their design from a simple utilitarian pattern to a more complex pattern. Initially the process involved tracing over a series of designs using a computer mouse and carefully locating the holes for the screws and release valve. The pattern was then laser cut out of MDF.

However when this process was used for the pattern it resulted in a design that lacked the hand engineered beauty of the original boards. To improve this the pattern was sketched using a digital pencil which translated the flowing analogue hand motions into a digital form. Whilst this process was less precise than the computer mouse it added the fluidity back into the pattern. Further examination of whether the boards could be 3D printed is being carried out.