I have often been asked how I first got into the laser cutting business. This is a great question. How does someone who has been a teacher for 30+ years suddenly go from the classroom to the tool shed? I had been teaching and running the school library for so long, and it was never on my agenda to give that up to do something creative. The journey, like many, began with a tiny seed and took many years to germinate and grow into a tangible idea, so slowly, I hardly knew it was happening until I ended up here. 

It all started on a relaxed holiday in the tiny town of Clarens. I had been looking for a particular gift for a friend for a while and had never managed to find quite what I was after. Wandering around Clarens, looking at all the shops and markets, I spotted something that I quite liked, although it wasn’t exactly what I was after. I told the person running the stall that I really liked this item but would have preferred different wording on it. No problem! She offered to custom make it for me. We picked up the gift a few days later and I was curious about the process of how she made it. Turns out it was laser cut and this began an eye-opening journey. I suddenly started to notice all the things that I had seen hundreds of times before but I could now see they were laser cut. 

For the rest of the holiday we walked around the stalls uttering the refrain: “This is also laser cut, so is that.” And the seed started to grow. Hubby told me that his 3D printer at home could take on a laser cutting adaptation and I could make all these things. Frankly, the idea terrified me. I have no idea how this 3D printer works and the software I had watched him use was so foreign to me. This was a conversation we had periodically over the years, pointing out laser cutting ideas to one another and talking about the possibilities of doing this ourselves. Still, the idea terrified me and seemed like some sort of remote idea or possibility. 

I think it all boils down to timing – the same idea under different circumstances. One day hubby casually mentioned that we could now get a stand alone laser cutter, instead of it being an extension of his 3D printer. The idea still scared me (lasers are scary, right?) but it seemed a bit more approachable on its own. I started to feel like I could learn the new software and it would be like designing something and then printing it on a printer, only much more complicated than that. I decided I would maybe try look into it a bit. 

I sat down at my computer and started doing some research. I saved over 100 designs and ideas that I was excited to try and before I turned around 3 hours had passed by without me realising it. A few days later I was lucky enough to receive my first laser cutter. I had no idea what to do with it or where to put it, in fact for the first week or two it was set up on my dining room table until we found a space for it. I spent the next 2 months learning everything I could about getting started. I watched dozens of tutorials, joined all the groups, read all the FAQs. I experimented and struggled and threw away so many mistakes, but slowly over time I started to get the hang of it. 

I began to love the craft and still smile every time I finish a cut and see what I have created, a feeling I hope never to lose. At the same time, I was beginning to feel increasingly confined by the rigid structure of the school day. I had been doing it for so long and I was getting a little tired of living by the bell. I was ready for a bit of freedom. I wanted the chance to come and go as I please, create my own schedule, work my own way. Of course it isn’t easy and there are problems and obstacles in everything we do, but they were my own problems and obstacles and I could deal with them in my way. And so I decided to take the bull by the horns and quit my job to develop and grow Virtually Anything. And I have never looked back.