OCTOBER | TECH
3D thinking
Studio Forty Three, a multi-disciplinary creative
design house and manufacturing workshop based in
Hampshire, is turning 3D designs into reality
S
tudio Forty Three was set up in
2014 by founder Thom Bridle.
The company specialises in 3D
digital design and manufacture using
state of the art in-house equipment
including 7-axis CNC milling robot
& large format 3D printers, alongside
a combination of 3D scanning,
modelling & CAD.
Thom Bridle started his career in
Jewellery and Interior Design and
owned his own gallery for a number
of years. After some time he felt
inspired to get more hands on and
did an apprenticeship with a joinery
company through which he was
introduced to CNC manufacturing.
After familiarising himself with the
industry and spotting the emerging
accessibility of 3D printing and the
symbiosis of the digital modelling
and the potential of sculptural CNC
machining he noticed that a lot of
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issues on projects were due to the lack
of fluidity between the creative design
and manufacturing process. This was
mainly due to being carried out by
different entities. This resulted in a
lot of ‘end products’ that didn’t work
and proved costly in the long run.
Bridle wanted to create a company
that could fuse the creative and
practical skills into one operation
resulting in greater efficiency overall
while enhancing the imaginative
possibilities. Thus Studio Forty Three
was born. We create anything and
everything, from jewellery to product
development for self-playing pianos,
monumental sculptures to event
props, out of production car parts to
tiger mountains.
Case Study: Tiger Mountain
Merlin Entertainments ran
into difficulties as the hand-made
maquette they had for the project
was the wrong scale, so needed
digitising. Studio Forty Three were
then brought in to do a 3D scan of the
tiger rock design and then created
a model which we were able to work
closely with architects to engineer
the installation and production
process required for such a big
project. The project took a total of
three months milling 24 hours/7
days a week and comprised of 260
differently separately milled pieces
of polystyrene that cleverly fitted
together over the steel architectural
structure a bit like a huge jigsaw
puzzle, which was then finished by
another contractor in concrete.
Result: The parent company
funding the project were extremely
impressed by our professionalism,
speed of delivery and the accuracy of
the finished product after the digital
sculptures were created. This has
given the industry a bit of a makeover
as projects that had previously proved
more costly and time-consuming are
now a slicker creative and production
process altogether as everyone knows
exactly what they’re going to get.
Niche: Studio Forty Three prides
itselves on its in-house skill set that
create anything from scratch. If you
can think of an idea, Studio Forty
Three can help make it a reality.