The Brassman India

Being over in Sector-58 at A-76 means dealing with a lot of industrial noise every single day. We work with brass here, and it’s heavy, loud stuff. My hands are usually stained with something or other by lunchtime. It isn't the cleanest job, but there's a certain way the light hits the polished pieces that makes it worth it. We started out small and just kept at it, year after year. The workshop floor is always cluttered with offcuts and tools that someone forgot to put back. It’s a bit of a maze sometimes. We make all sorts of brass items, depending on what people are asking for. Some days we're casting, other days we're just polishing until everything looks right. It gets really warm near the furnaces, especially in the summer months. I usually have a tea around four to keep going. We don't do much advertising; people just find us through word of mouth or by coming down to the sector. It’s a practical setup we’ve got. We don't have fancy leather chairs in the office, just old wooden ones and a lot of filing cabinets that have seen better days. It works for us. We just focus on the metal and making sure the dimensions are what they're supposed to be before things leave the gate. Sometimes we stay late when a big order is due. It's just life at the shop. The trucks come and go all day long.