Today we’d like to introduce you to Barry Hehemann.
Steve Mueller and Barry Hehemann graduated with Master of Fine Arts degrees in Sculpture from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign in 1978 and decided to start a metal fabrication business in Chicago as a way to make a living and continue to make sculpture. One year later they asked Mike, who was graduating from U of I Fine Arts, to join the company. All three original owners also did their undergraduate work in sculpture at the Herron School of Art, Indiana University Purdue University at Indianapolis, where they studied under Gary Freeman whose expertise in sculpture, foundry and metal fabrication laid the groundwork for Vector Custom Fabricating. Vector was founded as a custom architectural metals and sculpture fabrication company, but the immediate need to get up and running had us taking on all related work. We did a great deal of field welding repair, including restaurant equipment, truck trailers, wrecking equipment, fences and gates to name a few. We developed a close relationship with a family owned business, Eureka Welding, experts in welding repair. Now called Miller’s Eureka this relationship continues to this day with exchanges of materials and services. Since then Vector has become known for high quality Architectural Metals especially monumental stairs and railings and sculpture fabrication. Vector is still a small shop with 10 total personnel. Most of the team are art, sculpture, majors including the new members of the ownership team, Erik Lowe and Nathan Overley. Nathan has been at Vector starting as employee 20 years and Erik 17 years. Other Vector employees have an even longer tenure including Derick Malkemus also a sculptor, Herron Alumni and mentee of Gary Freeman. Vector as developed many friendly relationships in the industry which has allowed us to do large sophisticated jobs from a small shop on the west side by utilizing the expertise of a wide variety of subcontractors.
Overall, has it been relatively smooth? If not, what were some of the struggles along the way?
As mentioned we started doing a variety of work, not in our calling to pay the bills. This involved welding through the night on bulldozer buckets, early mornings in fast food restaurants repairing equipment, climbing in tar tank trucks to repair cracks, etc. Also the usual small business cash flow issues along the way. However, we’ve weathered recessions and slow times as competitors went out of business.
Please tell us about Vector Custom Fabricating.
Our ability to transform an architect, designer, or artist’s concept into reality as they envisioned it, and, more often than not, better than they envisioned it by applying our fabrication expertise and resources to the project.
Contact Info:
- Address: 2128 W Fulton St, Chicago, IL 60612
- Website: vectorfabricating.com; vectortheartoffabricating.com
- Phone: 3124215161
- Email: info@vectorfabricating.com
- Facebook: facebook.com/vectorfab
Image Credit:
1 – Vector team
2 – “Lucent”, artist: Wolfgang Buttress, Location: John Hancock Center, Chicago IL
Getting in touch: VoyageChicago is built on recommendations from the community; it’s how we uncover hidden gems, so if you know someone who deserves recognition please let us know here.
