I'm Tom. Most of my life people have come to me when they had something broken, something they wanted to build, something they couldn't figure out, or something they wanted to buy and didn't know if it was worth it. I didn't always know the answer, but I didn't know enough to say no either, so I learned. At some point the knowledge stacked up enough to be useful to other people, not just me.
The skills came from everywhere. Watching home improvement shows as a kid, taking apart electronics, maintaining a bike, then a motorcycle, then a car. When my parents got a house I started helping with real projects—plumbing, electrical, and carpentry. I studied engineering along the way, which gave me a more systematic way of thinking through problems.
I started writing it down here in 2011, partly to have a place to find it later if I needed it, and partly to help others the way others had helped me. Around that time I was in a difficult spot, and doing a lot of this myself wasn't optional. If I didn't figure it out, it didn't get done. That sense of necessity is baked into how I write.
Featured In & Trusted By
Since 2011, my designs and technical guides have been used by thousands of DIYers and cited as a resource by major publications and institutions, including:
- Media: Smithsonian Magazine, SFGate, Apartment Therapy, and Digital Trends.
- Tech & Making: Ars Technica, AnandTech, Adafruit, and ServeTheHome.
- Education: Research and project citations from the University of Waterloo and Boston University.
- Community Vetted: My plans (specifically for server racks and cabinetry) have been built and stress-tested by thousands of members across the Reddit, TrueNAS, and Unraid communities.
Why Trust This Site?
This site covers woodworking, cabinetry, home improvement, electrical, and code-level detail that most DIY blogs don't bother with. What I try to do differently is teach you how to think through the project, not just copy what I did. Your dimensions are different, your tools are different, and your constraints are different. Instead of just handing you a cut list, I walk you through the math and the reasoning so you can adapt it to your situation.
Experience-Based Expertise: I am not a professional contractor;I have a background in engineering, having been recruited directly out of my final year of college to work in the field.A lifelong maker. My guides are rooted in real-world application. Most projects on this site are things I have physically built, wired, or installed in my own home. For others, I share the detailed designs and technical plans I’ve engineered to solve specific problems—like my stair calculators or structural layouts. Whether I’ve already swung the hammer or I’m still in the design phase, the goal is the same: to provide the math and reasoning so you can build with confidence.
If you're new here, the frameless cabinet guide, the drawer box post, and the loft stair calculator are good places to start.
To everyone who has left a comment, sent an email, or taken the time to let me know something here helped them, thank you. You have no idea how much that means. The people who visit this site are genuinely great, and that support over the years has made it all worth it.
If you found this from a search, you're probably in the right place.