About us
WE MAKE COOL SHIT WITH OLD TOOLS.
We love almost forgotten crafts and techniques and bring them back to life with new designs. We manufacture casual goods for men with a vintage inspired and at the same time contemporary look. We only use the best materials for our premium quality goods.
877 WORKSHOP are Sylvia and Daniel Janssen. Founded in 2012, based in Hamburg, Germany.
If you are interested to see how we make our goods, follow us on Instagram
HISTORICAL TOOLS AND TECHNIQUES
We have a soft spot for old crafting techniques and are passionate collectors of historical tools and machines which we use for new designs. For making jewelry we use sandcasting, forging, turning, embossing, vitreous enamel and hand engraving. We use woodtype and letterpress for printing posters and t-shirts. We have a sweet spot for vintage hand operated chainstitch and freemotion embroidery machines for making patches and customizing garments.
Vintage embossing tools
We own a very rare collection of over 700 historic, hand-engraved die forms from 1910 from Pforzheim / Germany – the former, internationally known through the Paris World Exhibition in 1900, center of European jewelry production. In the highest precision the Pforzheimer engravers have engraved filigree designs by hand into the hard steel. 10 tons of pressure are needed to deform the metal in the steel mold to form a ring or a badge.
Hand-engraving
Daniel, who worked 7 years as a master in engraving before getting his master in arts & design, engraves with a traditional graver and engravers ball motifs into the metal of our windproof lighters, signet rings and bangles.
Machine engraving
Daniel also engraves steel stamps on a 1960s engraving machine, which then are hardened and burned to emboss various designs with 5 tons pressure into thick bronze, brass, copper or sterling silver coins. The motif coins are then filed, shaped, polished, patinated and processed to push buttons, badges, pins and closures.
Custom engraving
We are happy to customize most of our products with your individual letters, numbers or motifs. You find an overview of our customizable products here. Examples of custom engraved signet rings are here.
Vitreous enamel
Enamel is powdered glass that is melted on the metal at temperatures between 700 and 800 degrees Celsius. The technique of vitreous enamel really old - the ancient Egyptians applied enamels to jewellery, metal objects and and pottery. Glass enamel is characterised by beautiful glossy surfaces and vibrant colors.
Metalworks
We use a lathe from 1928 for turning closures, rivets and buttons and historical tools like burin, steel tools, engraving machine and engravers ball as well as hand stamps for a special handcrafted look and feel. We also use the traditional goldsmith’s techniques of forging, shaping, chasing, setting, filing, soldering and more. We only work with solid metals like 14ct Gold, 925 Sterling Silver and brass.
Besides metalworks we are absolutely fascinated by historic machine embroidery. We have a vintage Chain Stitching machine from 1920 and a freemotion embroidery machine from 1950. Both machines are operated freehand – the Chain Stitching machine is operated by guiding the needle with a crank handle along the drawing, for the free motion embroidery a stitching frame is moved by hand to create the motif. You can literally write and paint with theses machines. The process is very time-consuming and so it's not surprising that is was replaced by computer embroidery to be economically viable. But in the end the making is so much fun and the results are absolutely unique with a charming imperfect look and feel.
What does 877 stands for?
877 is the number of the color silver in the Pantone Color System. The Pantone system is used in a variety of industries notably graphic design, fashion design, product design, printing and manufacturing. As we both studied arts & design this number symbolizes our connection of design (the color silver) and craft (the material silver).