Steampunk adding machines

They’re actually electric, but Andy Aaron’s aesthetic is all pseudo-late-Victorian:

The assumption behind modern electronics is that smaller is better. So I have set about completely re-thinking and re-building the electronic calculator using old-fashioned heavyweight switches, cranks, and levers mounted in antique chassis.

I turn out only a few Aaron Adding Machines a year. Every Aaron Adding Machine works perfectly and each is unique. I strive to have my pieces look like they are functional, utilitarian, mass-produced devices plucked from some imaginary office of another era. Perhaps the 19th century, perhaps a time that never existed.

Sorry if this post got all Boing Boing there for a second, but these calculators just look really cool.

Aaron Adding Machines via Maria Popova - @brainpicker.

• gadgets