A Hano Inspired Toy

Earlier this year I stumbled across this beautiful gorilla toy by David Weeks. I had just started a woodworking course and our first project was to create a small wooden toy.

I adored Hano and wanted to create my own, friendlier version. I've always loved orangutans so I decided to try my hand at designing one. Here's the final result:


Little did I know at the start how difficult it would be as part of the brief was to only use hand tools. I certainly learned a lot from the project, particularly how to sculpt on the small scale and some very interesting ways of creating an elastic joint that can be positioned any which way.

It was a wonderful first project and I'm looking forward to getting back into the workshop next year. In the mean time I'm slowly building up my tool collection.