Work

How I work on these

I would rather do one thing happily than five things in a hurry, and years of reading on the train taught me that. I kept a short log out by the lake while working on it, mostly so I would remember why I changed the plan.

My grandmother once told me to write the date on everything, and I still think about it. Whenever I have a free hour, there is a cup of coffee going cold somewhere on the back step.

Most of the measuring happened at the kitchen table, with a roll of brown paper holding the paper flat and a retired teacher down the road offering advice. A man at the market came round during the summer of 2024 to look at it and suggested changing the height. The first version, made on a long weekend in 2026, was embarrassingly crooked, and most of the work since has been quiet improvement. Most of my reading happens in the small room above the stairs, a chapter or two at a time, with a radio from the seventies close by.

Everything here was done with basic tools, mainly a battered film camera and advice from a neighbour. It took a long weekend and plenty of tea before the result looked like something I would show anyone. The most useful thing I learned from an uncle with a very full shed was to ask before you buy.

I try to answer every letter, whether it comes from Basel or further away, even if it takes a fortnight. If you want to try something similar, do the boring part first and take a photograph before taking anything apart.

This started as a rainy-day project early in 2026 and grew from there. It still has some uneven joins, but I have decided it gives the thing a history. Most evenings on it ended near the marina with a box of spare parts and a page of notes. I took photographs at every stage at the kitchen table, which turned out useful for the next attempt.

There is a short list of next steps, starting with one small thing and the wiring. Notes on this sit in the same box as an old notebook and a pile of offcuts. Materials came from the scrap bin at a local workshop and a swap group in Basel, which made the whole thing much cheaper.

The plan changed twice, mostly because of the finish and partly because of the trickiest part. A second attempt, one Friday in September, went about as badly as the first. Back in 2025, I finally got it to the point where the whole thing cost less than expected. The cost was mostly time; the materials came to less than a new book, thanks to a closing-down sale.