Building features is a whole lot of fun and always a wonderful challenge. One of the many current projects is a large tree that will ‘grow’ over the entrance to a new bridge. We had to think about clearances, balance, mounting and transport while staying true to the design and story. The finished piece has to fit inside a regular transport trailer. Our height limit is just over eight feet. Clearance under the lowest part of the tree branch is a foot higher than that. This meant we needed to build the tree in two sections. The challenge is to hide that seam within the textures of the tree. The tree also leans way out over the bridge which means it wants to tip -especially since we are building it with heavy steel and concrete. The structure is relatively simple and extra heavy duty. Four inch square tubing that had half inch thick walls was the easiest and quickest solution. All of the ends of the tubing were bevelled and then welded in multiple passes to create super strong joints. We actually drilled holes in our concrete floor to anchor the feature securely while we work on it. Heavy duty lift and anchor points will be fabricated into each of the pieces for safe transport and assembly. It doesn’t look much like a tree yet but in the next days we will change that. Stay tuned…