Aviation, history, art, and more.
I love history, and airplanes. I don't know which I love most.
I run a reprographics shop in downtown Littleton, Colorado. But I've been drawing and designing for fun all my life - my first airplane caricature probably dates to 1975 or so. For some reason, people are wanting to pay me for doing what I do for fun. So this website is here to give people information about what I do, how I do it, and make some of my products available to sell. And I would guess if you've come to this site you might be a person much like me and so you might enjoy some interesting stories and links to some of my favorite sites. So sit down, make yourself a proper cup of English tea and enjoy Albion Design Centre.
I do like monocles, too.
First of all, this is who I am. (Unfortunately, my eyes have gotten worse so I don't use the monocle regularly as I once did.) As you can see, I don't like cameras much, but I rather like the clothing, equipment, and general attitudes of the Victorian era. I am a British citizen, the son of an English couple who never quite got around to leaving the colonies to go home. But I was born and raised in Colorado, so the English accent was beaten out of me in kindergarten. I spell some things a bit differently (colour), and use some expressions that many people find odd ("better than a kick in the teeth with a wet lettuce"). But I am proud of being a bit strange - one-quarter Strange, actually, and I have the family Bible to prove it.
I don't like technology, but one has to endure trials in life.
You see, I like "flying" shapes such as aircraft and sharks. This might or might not be because I grew up around airplane engineers - my father apprenticed at Boulton Paul during WWII, and eventually moved to the United States to work with airplane and spacecraft companies. I can tell you where my family was in the stands for the Skylab launch. Unfortunately, some of this interest in flight does drag me into a bit of technology, but I try to keep it to a minimum; my favorites are the WWI and WWII airplanes. The reprographics business I spent 14 years working for, and bought in 2008, also has got me a bit overinvolved in technology. I have to know something about computers to make my printers work, and they do save some time working on my drawings. I'm sorry to have to admit I've learned enough about computers to do some website design.
A 100-year-old airplane sums up my interests very well.
On a recent trip to England, I happened to be visiting the Shuttleworth collection just as they were bringing out and firing up their 1909 Bleriot XI. I turned on my camera, and if you are patient enough to wait for the long download, click on the picture here to hear the sound of a 100-year-old airplane that still flies regularly.
And speaking of Bleriot XIs, this year Albion Design Centre is celebrating the 100-year anniversary of Louis Bleriot's flight across the English Channel on July 25, 1909. If you aren't familiar with the event, read about and see pictures and reenactments on these sites.