The Making of the 2024 Alumni Award
The Stew Makerspace shares an inside view of the making of the Alumni Award:
When the Office of Development and Alumni Relations approached the Stew Makerspace about creating the 2024 Alumni Awards, we immediately knew we wanted to incorporate a pen. This year we were very fortunate to receive instruction from Rick Kelling, a long time Grinnell resident and recent retiree, who generously donated his time teaching our student monitors how to use a wood lathe.
Early during the Stew’s creation, the college’s Facilities Management department gifted us with a quantity of wood from trees brought down during the expansion of ARH into the HSSC. We’ve always wanted to do something special with this wood, and this was the perfect chance! The campus wood used to make the pen is walnut. We used a darker walnut for the base to compliment the pen (however the wood used in the base did not come from campus; we want to make sure we have enough campus wood to make pens for many years to come!).
The Alumni Award was designed by Jonah Pratt ’24, who has worked at the Stew as both a monitor and a manager over the last three years. His goal was to create something both beautiful and functional, whether one chooses to carry the pen with them, or leave it on its base. In addition to Jonah, a team of monitors including Sam Sirna ’25, Nina Vo ’25, Jana Vadillo ’26, and Kylen Turner ’26, all had a hand in making the pens.