Steam Bending a Wooden Corset

Using scraps from her first foray into wooden canoe building, TotalBoat Ambassador, Xyla Foxlin, decided to attempt next level steam bending and made herself a wooden corset. You could argue everyone needs a fiberglassed, steam-bent, wooden strip corset – but maybe if this is on your project list you’ll reconsider after seeing how much work it was!   Xyla, after completing her canoe build, was determined to leave no scraps behind, and with her new understanding of bending strip wood onto forms, she figured this would be easy! Watch her video and see if she was wrong!

Xyla is, among other things, a creative force of fun, an entrepreneur, a mechatronics engineer, a pilot, a Ted Talk Speaker, a Miss Cleveland contestant, a woodworker, and now, a canoeist. She is co-founder of her most recent startup, Beauty and the Bolt, an effort focused on lowering the barrier to entry for women and minorities in STEM fields. By putting power tools in the hands of princesses, she inspires the next generation of girls by showing girls much more than just how to use their first power tools. She is all about overcoming the princess stereotypes that tried to pin her down along her climb to the top of most of her pursuits. Her determination and will to squelch the naysayers’ fuels her ambition – and this woman has some ambition.

Be sure to go follow all of Xylas channels and exploits – because we know she is about to be up to some pretty amazing things. She was just visiting our TB campus “making” with us using epoxy resin, laser cutters, and airplanes!!  We can’t wait to show you! (no steam bending involved – altho we are hoping to take her canoe for a spin in Bristol Harbor this morning. Look for our voyage on Instagram and the upcoming video on the Narwhal Labs YouTube Channel. 

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