Robots That Should Have Existed in the Past

A photographic tour of Gordon Bennett's mid-century robot workshop

Gordon Bennett makes robots out of mid-century machine parts. They are beautiful and oddly human. You can read our story about him, which includes a video. Here's an excerpt:

When I first saw the robots, they were standing among the goods at City Foundry, a Brooklyn vintage store piled high with $400 chairs. I pressed my nose to the window and stared: thigh-high and remarkably evocative robots constructed solely from mid-century mechanical components looked back. Their legs were struts; car insignias formed chests. Everything fit. They were sculptures made from things no one makes anymore and most wouldn't recognize. They looked like characters from a lost sci-fi movie Pixar made in 1955. You just want to hug them.
I decided that I had to meet their maker. I wanted to see the workshop. I accosted the store's proprietor with my request and he told me I should just go to BennettRobots.com.

It was a Saturday afternoon, and I only had 24 hours left in town. So, when I saw the phone number on the site, I called it. To my surprise, a man answered. He was game. Within an hour, I was headed to a random street in a no-name neighborhood between Park Slope and Greenwood. I was going to see a robot workshop in a basement! I got so excited that I left my phone in the cab.

Alexis C. Madrigal

Alexis Madrigal is a senior editor at The Atlantic, where he oversees the Technology channel. He's the author of Powering the Dream: The History and Promise of Green Technology. More

The New York Observer calls Madrigal "for all intents and purposes, the perfect modern reporter." He co-founded Longshot magazine, a high-speed media experiment that garnered attention from The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and the BBC. While at Wired.com, he built Wired Science into one of the most popular blogs in the world. The site was nominated for best magazine blog by the MPA and best science Web site in the 2009 Webby Awards. He also co-founded Haiti ReWired, a groundbreaking community dedicated to the discussion of technology, infrastructure, and the future of Haiti.

He's spoken at Stanford, CalTech, Berkeley, SXSW, E3, and the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, and his writing was anthologized in Best Technology Writing 2010 (Yale University Press).

Madrigal is a visiting scholar at the University of California at Berkeley's Office for the History of Science and Technology. Born in Mexico City, he grew up in the exurbs north of Portland, Oregon, and now lives in Oakland.