Blacksmithing Workshop

A workshop participant holds a completed iron hook up in the foreground while others work at the fire and a second anvil in the background, with blue sky beyond.
Photo by Megan Bean

February 8, 2022

A recent Blacksmithing Workshop, presented by MSU's Idea Shop and hosted by the Department of Art’s sculpture division, demonstrated how to make a metal wall hook. Idea Shop manager and workshop instructor Steven Bailey, pictured tending the fire, explained how to use heat to shape and forge metal and helped MSU students and Starkville residents utilize a newly built coal forge. Operated in partnership by the university’s College of Business and School of Human Sciences, the Idea Shop--located on Main Street in Starkville--houses the Turner A. Wingo Maker Studio and the MSU Retail Product Accelerator. The Maker Studio contains a myriad of wood, polymer, and metal prototyping equipment, as well as an electronics workbench and design suite. The Retail Product Accelerator helps entrepreneurs test market products in a fully-working retail store and gives students experience operating a business.