Journey

In 2016, as a high school freshman, I got interested in electronics and building my own PC. I found r/mechanicalkeyboards, where people showed off cool keyboards on their desks. I kept researching, got more involved in the community, went to local and larger meetups, and eventually built my first keyboard: a KBD 8x with holy chickies (holy pandas were too expensive, like $5 a switch!). Later, I got into vintage Cherry after OG Cherry ABS doubleshot keycaps won the best keycap award at the Deskthority Awards that year. Friends like Mcmaxmcmc and Photekq patiently answered my questions and pointed me in the right direction.

Philosophy

The best part about keyboards are the people that they bring together. Without the people, a keyboard is just a means for instructing a computer what to do. People bring the creativity, passion, and love that make the hobby what it is. Every keyboard has a story: who used it, what they used it for, or how you're using it now. Keyboards are how we interact with these machines, and it's up to us to make our own stories with them.

Preservation

"Saving what we can, while we can" is my main goal in collecting these keyboards. I can't home them all, but I want to document and share what I can with the wider keyboard community. Projects like KBDArchive, Admiral Shark's KB's, and others have been great resources for preserving and sharing this history. Any "harvested" keycaps can still be paired with their original keyboard, as long as I was given the board too. I also try to keep original systems and their keyboards together rather than part them out.