The word "steel" typically conjures up images of hulking bridges, skyscrapers, and a certain superhero from a distant planet made of said material. But for two local metal working professionals, steel is the alloy of choice for creating a wide variety of structures and sculptures. 

Bach Ornamental and Structural Steel

“Come with me, and you’ll be in a world of pure imagination ....”

Thus begins the song that leads us into chocolate room of Willy Wonka’s factory. Stepping inside the shop of Bach Steel in Holt gives you a similar feeling. Although there’s nothing to eat, and you might lose a finger if you touch anything, you get the sense that this is indeed a place where magical things happen courtesy of the gifted hands of Nels Raynor.

As he told it, “My dad was a ceramics professor at Michigan State. I used to go with him every weekend. I threw pots, but I liked to hang out in the sculpture lab. I was about 12 years old when I decided I wanted to play with metal, and I’ve never done anything else.” He began working with iron at 19, held several jobs at several companies, and started Bach Steel in 1997. Although “pretty much self-taught,” he does have an associate’s degree from Lansing Community College, and worked at Jericho Steel in Mason.

His company does both ornamental and structural steel work, which makes it unique for the area. He said it’s been in the last year that people have really started paying attention to his work, and he attributes that to one job: The Greater Lansing Association of Realtors® new headquarters. How did it come about? “They had a rail designed to go in there, and I didn’t like it; so I went to the lady and said, ‘Look, I won’t charge you any more, but it’s a high traffic area, where there’ll be a lot of architects and designers coming in. Would you be interested in my doing an ornamental rail for you?’ And she said, ‘Sure.’ And that’s how it started.”

Raynor has sold work in Wyoming, Idaho and Texas, but the vast majority stays in Michigan, and most of that in mid-Michigan, including a fancy cable rail system for the new Christman building downtown, and several exclusive homes in the area. Bach Steel also recently completed the biggest steel truss bridge that’s ever been refabricated, located part way between Lansing and Grand Rapids.

Raynor does all the ornamental work himself, and currently has three men who work for him; but he’s flexed up to six, depending on the work load. Of the ornamental work, he said, “Really, it’s a hard thing to do. I do it more out of love of what I do than the money. I can’t pay my bills by the love of it, but if you were to do it just because you wanted to make money at it, you’d have to be a whiz at it.” He also said that although people “fall in love” with high-end ornamental work, “If people see something that’s close for a lot less money, they’ll go for it.”

Asked what type of people make good metal workers, Raynor said, “I’d just as soon have someone come in with very little experience and be able to teach them how to do it, then have someone come in here with all this knowledge of what they think they’re supposed to be able to do. It’s very hard to break those habits.”

He summed up by saying, “We’ve got a great reputation for the quality of the work that we do and that’s the number one [thing] I won’t sacrifice. And I don’t care if I have to lose money on the job. [I’ll ask myself] would I put that in my house? If not, I’ll tear it apart. I’m pretty picky.”

ThayerHouse Forge and Studio

Travel east on Grand River Avenue just past downtown Webberville and you’ll find metal-working artisan Douglas Thayer, who, up until June 2002, was a draftsman for an oil company. He’d gotten into working with metal in the late 1990s, but after taking a two-day blacksmithing class at Tillers International in Scotts, Michigan, he was hooked. Tillers teaches people Old World professions, such as blacksmithing, timber framing, and how to handle oxen.

In the early stages of his new career, Thayer went out to art fairs, and got commission work “here and there,” in addition to getting his work into a couple of galleries, notably the Lansing Art Gallery. Early on, he realized “the key is that you have to be out in front of the public continually. [You] have to keep your name out there.” Doing so, Thayer has built up a clientele that likes to buy something that’s custom built. Several of them come back every year or two, asking him to build something new for them.

He creates a lot of furniture, most notably tables, which he said “seems to be my direction. They’ll have an idea of what they’re after, [like] ‘I need a coffee table, and this is what I want it to look like.’” Thayer takes it from there, but said he never has any unsatisfied clients, because if the person doesn’t like the piece, he’ll take it back and build them something else. He also “lets them live with it for a few days” to make sure it’s the right fit.

From furniture to sculptures to driveway gates, everything he creates is one of a kind. He draws his pieces out in chalk until he gets what he wants, then uses his home-built coal forge, two old Peter-Wright anvils, welder, saws, grinders and/or saw-blasting cabinet to get the desired results.

Thayer works most in the warm months because, quite simply, in the winter his shop hovers at around 20 to 30 degrees. For the past few years, by June or July, his backlog has pushed him into the coming year. He has two to three projects going at any time. Although the vast majority of his work comes through commission, he attends some art fairs, including those in Williamston and Meridian Township.

He also puts on demonstrations in front of the Lansing Art Gallery, partly to promote his art, but also because he thinks it’s important to “talk to the young people and let them see this stuff.”

Like Raynor, Thayer believes that metalworking is an art form that could be going the way of the dinosaur. But as long as veritable magicians with steel such as these two continue, their form of art won’t be disappearing from the Lansing area anytime soon.