Hi everybody! Is anyone beginning a new project out there that will take some time to complete? If so, here is some inspiration. We have been at this project for a little over two weeks, cycling the epoxy pours and drying time and such, but just like you, we stuck to it, even managing to sneak in some mid week pours, so we could complete it this weekend.

We did have a minor laser head collision with our template paper as you’ll see but fortunately, no harm was done. It’s still a little comical though ????. For the sake of brevity I have sort of glossed over some of the details pertaining to how we did every step of the template process so if you have any questions, fire away!

I’m still learning how to best integrate still photos into the video so you’ll see that some of them are partials and I don’t know why so I’m posting them here as well as the embeds in the video so you can zoom in if you want. I will say that we very much nailed the sealing of the paper puzzles after the few small leaks in the first one so that was a win for sure. So whether you’re mounting a cardboard or a wooden puzzle there is definitely a way to get a great result.

I should also say that you could go to the expense and effort of sanding, buffing, and a second pour to make your puzzle’s epoxy coating perfectly flat. We didn’t choose to do that; you probably know by now that our lower level is a casual, multi purpose space; museum quality mirror finishes are not necessary. But for the sake of education; know that these lovely, texture adding, tactile waves can be sanded out, a mold for a second pour constructed, and another layer of epoxy could have been added. I kind of like the slightly irregular finish but to each their own!

We have 3-4 more puzzles that we will assemble over time so the puzzle wall is deliberately organic/asymmetric. We will add them as we finish and seal them so the overall flow will end up being improvisational.

One last thing. Dr. Meek graduated me from gopher/documentarian to full on Epoxy Maven during this process! I sealed puzzles, poured and spread epoxy, torched epoxy, and tented our pieces. I confess to being a complete novice who reads and observes a lot but has never worked with epoxy before. I got my fly up wings and my sea legs with a great teacher and Total Boat! Woot woot!

Get out there and make something gorgeous!

Dana