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We’ve been trying out a small gallery space in downtown Austin to test the proverbial waters. We call it our Satellite Gallery and it has a great location – between 4th & 5th Streets on the east side of Brazos St. (which is 1 block east of Congress).

10 years ago, Cid Galindo, our landlord had the forethought to turn one of the very large first floor condo units into, not only his living quarters and office, but also 6 additional offices that generate income for him, as well as a shared space that he hoped would be used as a gallery. This space has a conference table, which can be reserved by any of the tenants for meetings during the week. We have leased this gallery space in order to have a presence in Austin and a comfortable space to meet with our clients that may find this location more convenient than driving to Wimberley. There is a significant amount of art hanging in this small space and we will be using the gallery to hold exhibitions on an ongoing basis.

As we also have gallery space at The Art Lab in Wimberley, we frequently switch out works between the two depending upon needs at the time. For instance, we are in the process of preparing to launch Fe29 in Wimberley and will need to have a representative sample of all of the types of work that we have produced to date for the opening, so have taken some of the works from the Satellite Gallery and will replace them after the opening. Please note however, that we do not staff the Satellite Gallery. Visitors are encouraged to drop in during normal business hours and peruse our works, but don’t expect the good looking fellow sitting behind the double doors in what appears to be the curator’s office to jump up and ask if you need assistance, as he is Cid, simply working in his office.

With the shop completed, the job of gathering tools and materials began in earnest. RC kindly left behind some purlins to make tables, and a welder (until we could get one of our own) and grinders that were easy to use for smaller hands. Our wonderful worker Manuel pitched in and we all got stuck in building tables, a hammering station, shelves & racks. John Gallagher appeared with a trailer load of timber (mahogany, long leaf pine, locust, maple, etc), boats and some old masts, all of which will be invaluable in future projects. A number of trips to the metal and scrap yards and we now have an impressive array of materials for our artists.

Thank you RC, John, Manuel and all of those who helped us get up and running.

What would we have done had we not run across RC Crawford and his Texas Iron Buildings?  We cannot thank you enough RC, for the wonderful “Art Lab” that you built for us. We just LOVE it! As does everyone that stops in. You built a good, solid shop for a reasonable price and we all enjoyed the process.  You were a pleasure to work with and we’re certainly glad to call you our friend.

Check out a few of the images above that I took during the construction. I wish I could figure out how to resize and include a short video or two, as RC’s patented method of “raising the roof” is something to behold. He uses a come-along on the four corners of each section of roof and ratchets the completed section, along with insulation, up to the top. Let me tell you – this man is really something!

OK, well there are a few others we would like to thank. Like Manuel Perez, who labored under difficult and uncomfortable circumstances to put the second layer of insulation in the ceiling and walls = 12 inches in total so we can all stay comfortably even in the hot Texas summers. Then came Brian Collins, who (with Manuel’s assistance) worked around everybody to create a wall separating the main shop from a climate controlled finishing room; install the metal lining on the walls (so sparks won’t be a problem),  the power (with outlets every 5 foot along every wall) , and 8 T8 lights. Oh and of course we shouldn’t forget the recycled double glazed low-e doors that he re-purposed for windows and the VERY large insulated door donated by a friend that Brian used to create a pocket door between the two rooms. Last but not least we need to thank Manuel again for his efforts to install the two hoists on the I-beam way up there. That was of course after Jim Miller has welded (oh such beautiful welds) the hoists to the trolleys.

So Thank You RC, Brian, Manuel and Jim. We just love our new workshop.