Well, summer is here and we’re finally making good progress in the new shop.   Sorry it’s been so long since our last update!  This is just a quick post to share one of our current in-progress projects… it’s a mobile bar for Sam Hughes’ Place Restaurant in Tucson.  SHP’s management plans to use this in the rooms where they have larger parties – to avoid trips across the restaurant to the main bar.  We were sort of thinking it would be a great thing to have in the backyard by the pool!  In any case, you can see the mobile bar in progress here.  Stay cool! 

We recently squeezed a quick project into our schedule to donate to a charity event for the Boys & Girls Club of the East Valley – Gilbert Chapter.  We decided a wine rack would be a good auction item…so we embarked on creating one.  It was a different kind of project for us – a much smaller piece than we usually build, but it was a lot of fun.  You can check it out by clicking here.By the way, the charity event is a golf tournament coming up on Friday, May 9, 2008 and we hear there are still spots remaining for golfers.  If you are interested, please call the Boys & Girls Club at 480.813.2020 for more details!

As you are likely aware, the term “green” has become very popular within the past few years. I come across the term almost every day, whether it’s in a trade magazine, the newspaper, local news or a home improvement TV show. Let’s consider for a moment what exactly is “green”: is it green to put your empty water bottle in the blue recycle bin? Is it green to drive an electric vehicle? Is it green to capture rain water and store it for irrigation use? The answer to all of the above is “yes”… and much more.

The term “green building” is not mentioned as often as just “green”, which has become a general term for being environmentally friendly in numerous ways. Referencing our favorite know-it-all source, here is the Wikipedia definiiton for “Green Building”:

“Green building is the practice of increasing the efficiency with which buildings use resources — energy, water, and materials — while reducing building impacts on human health and the environment, through better siting, design, construction, operation, maintenance, and removal — the complete building life cycle.”

So how does this apply to CK Valenti Designs? Soon our website will have a page dedicated to green building, and in the coming months you will see how we will apply green building to our projects. This doesn’ t mean we will get into the business of constructing complete buildings – we simply plan to demonstrate green techniques on our smaller projects that make their final home in residential and commercial buildings. We’ve started our focus on using green products, recycling unused lumber, and decreasing the emissions of VOC’s. As we mature along the green building lifecycle, we’ll continue to let you know.

Stay tuned! – Chris

Yesterday Kate asked me: “What is anodizing?” Well, the Wikipedia definition is the following: “Anodizing, or anodising, is an electrolytic passivation process used to increase the thickness of the natural oxide layer on the surface of metal parts.” My response was a little less technical — it is a method for coloring aluminum. It is not a coating that sits on the surface but is more like stain that penetrates the pores of the aluminum and remains semi-transparent. It’s a very popular process with automotive parts where the aesthetic appearance is important. You may ask, “why is he telling me this?” This is the process we are using on our current semi-conductor project. As a component of the product demonstration display, we have 5/16″ aluminum plates anodized red, and it looks great.  Click here to check out the finished product. 

The news of our grand opening has led to a rush of interest, which we are very excited about. So what are we working on now?

1. A local semi-conductor company is keeping us busy with more project demonstration displays (http://ckvalentidesigns.com/gallery/demo_mchp/index.html)

2. A mobile bar for Sam Hughes’ Place Restaurant in Tucson, AZ. SHP is a returning customer (see http://ckvalentidesigns.com/gallery/copper_shp/index.html, http://ckvalentidesigns.com/gallery/led_shp/index.html) – and did we mention the food is excellent? Stop by the next time you’re in Tucson.

3. Next in line is a built-in bench/table for a residential billiard room – drawings to be started soon!

We appreciate all the comments and emails and promise to get to this journal more often!

We are very pleased to announce that our new office/workshop is finished!  We are now taking on new projects!

Along with our new look we are trying out a new journaling feature on our website.  Primarily we want this to be a space to showcase the projects we are working on with pictures and commentary.  We’re new to this blog thing so we’d love to hear your comments.

- The CKV team