Melbourne Repurposed Furniture Designer Reveals Benefits for Buying Handmade Products

With high levels of product exports coming to Australia from Asia, it’s currently easier, cheaper, and faster for people to buy items off the shelf or online, instead of commissioning things to be made or crafted. As a result, quality products from apprentices and masters are fast becoming a lost art form, because people are opting to learn through lessons, books and tutorials instead of accepting the gift of teaching through generations.

Melbourne repurposed furniture designer and founder of Custom Industrial – a unique furniture and lighting design company – Durwin Lambe believes international imports and the ‘want it now’ mentality are maintaining unrealistic ideas about the worth of handcrafted products, and silencing the benefits of buying handmade. “People stopped investing in timelessness and craftsmanship, because everyone wanted everything straight away without being prepared to pay for it,” says Durwin. www.customindustrial.com.au

“But there’s a movement growing legs at the moment, where people are experiencing deep satisfaction making, fixing, or restoring things themselves, and the value of having the soul or character of a person in a product is making a comeback.”

A handcrafted item isn’t created with computerised machines, production lines or shortcuts. A handmade product comes to life with a lot of care, time and soul from the maker, to the point where most craftspeople become emotionally attached to their creations, much like a parent with a child. They see the item evolve and grow, then eventually leave their workshop for the product’s new home. www.customindustrial.com.au

“When buying handmade you buy a story and a piece of history, something to be proud of. I know that everything I make must pass a simple acid test. If I want to keep it for myself, then I know it’s ready for my client. If you’re thinking of purchasing or commissioning something handmade, know that in doing so, you have supported your local artisans and have kept alive what could possibly be a dying art,” says the Melbourne repurposed furniture designer.

“There’s a quality to handmade things that you just can’t buy off the shelf. Handcrafted items are different to things that have been mass produced, because you can see the passion and care in each piece.”

To learn more about the environmentally friendly products and furniture pieces Custom Industrial individually customises and creates, visit www.customindustrial.com.au.
 

About Custom Industrial

Custom Industrial is a unique furniture and lighting design company specialising in the re-purposing of old machinery, parts and unusual items into exclusive pieces. Everything Custom Industrial creates is individual, using timeless craftsmanship. Their products are made to last using the best measure of both time-honoured techniques blended with modern day efficiencies.

The business was born from a love of the unique and interesting, and influenced by the founder’s family history working in and around the wharves, surrounded by patina worn, heavy industrial machinery. Combining this with skills gained in the building and timber industries, a passion was fuelled for turning the unusual and unique into custom pieces of furniture and lighting that captured the feeling of those childhood memories.
 

Contact Information

Durwin Lambe

Founder

Custom Industrial

(61) 438 805 522

durwin@customindustrial.com.au