In a nutshell, we make unique things for our clients.
We are a pioneering product design, engineering, and fabrication workshop; we take great pride in blending old school traditional craftsmanship (hand woodworking, metalworking) with modern digital tools (3D printers, laser cutters, CNC mills, etc.) We are makers and artisans at heart but also bring the rigor and discipline of professional design and engineering to every project.
What sets us apart is that we are a one-stop shop, we design and build entire products, from mechanical components to electronics hardware (including custom circuit boards and embedded firmware) and software such Artificial Intelligence/Machine Learning (AI/ML) algorithms, Internet of Things (IoT) cloud services and mobile applications.
How It All Started
We launched Green Shoe Garage in 2012 as embedded electronics design studio. Our initial focus being on rapid prototyping the “digital brains” of the smart devices that we now all use every day. We built prototypes, designed circuit boards, and wrote secure and efficient firmware. And at the end of the day we handed over the design files, source code, and hardware to our clients who would take it to industrial designers to incorporate the electronics into finished products.
But then our clients began to ask us if we could just build everything. Not just the electronics and firmware but the mechanical components as well. And could we integrate the electronics, software and mechanical into finished object? It was a challenge we couldn’t pass on.
Rethinking Product Development for a Digital World
Shifting our focus from just electronics to overall product development was not a decision made lightly. We had to ask ourselves two questions:
- What would we bring to the table that would set us apart from the competition?
- What skills would we need to develop and what tools would we need to invest in?
We knew from talking with our clients that they most valued our fast turnaround times and ability to deliver on budget. We knew that most fabrication shops focused just on mechanical and structural. We also knew that electronics design houses relied on offshore manufacturing. So we had to find ways to design and build mechanical and electrical/electronics inhouse and do so in a highly integrated manner. And we had to do both more efficiently than anyone else.
We already had some limited in-house mechanical design and fabrication capabilities to create items such as test jigs for our circuit board test and evaluation. We simply expanded those capabilities project by project. 3D design and 3D printing was a skill we added early. The digital workflow integrated well into our circuit board design workflows. This digital nature appealed greatly to us. Thus as we added other skills such as woodworking, metalworking, leatherworking, vacuum forming, and resins; we looked to not only develop old school hands-on skills but also invested in modern CNC machines to increase efficiency and repeatability whenever feasible.
Today we are experts at blending the traditional with the modern tools and workflows. And now we deliver finished products to our clients on time and on budget.
What Kind of Things Have We Made?
We have years of design, engineering, and fabricating experience across a variety of product categories, including industrial control systems, home automation products, environmental monitoring systems, building automation, escape room technologies, adult toys, unmanned systems, wearable electronics, and even high-tech art installations.